Here we are again, after almost 2 whole years without a single blog post, nor a cool car driven. “Where have you been?”, you might be asking. The answer quite simply is that I do not answer to you. I’m the one who asks questions around here and I demand answers.
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The good news, however is that today I’m coming in with a freaking banger. A six banger as a matter of fact. I recently got the chance to drive the BMW M440i ‘X-Drive’ of the G22 generation. I thought to myself that it had been a while since I went to go annoy some poor salesman by asking for a test drive knowing full well that I was not going to buy whatever product I was testing. This time that salesman was a chap by the name of Roland at Supertech BMW in Durban. The good-ish news is that I told Roland that I was not going to be buying the car beforehand so there was no way he could accuse me of wasting his time.
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Poor Roland probably thought that he was going to convince me to buy the M440i, little did he know that I only currently have enough money to stand next to the car and say ‘wow’. The Beemer goes for nearly R1.4 million. I will be honest, I do not have the desire to sell my soul to the devil, but I am currently hiring it out and I still don’t have that kind of cash lying around. All of this then begs the question; is the M440i worth the price tag?
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Honestly, I do not know. I will let the economists and all the other mathematical and financial boffins be the judge of that. What I can comment on, however is whether the car gave me a smile worth over a million bucks. As much as it pains me to say this, especially of a BMW, a brand that has captured my heart since adolescence, I did not give me the million rand smile I was hoping for. It felt odd for me to be in a fast Bavarian and not feel the fizz. It did not make me feel young and carefree as I would have imagined it would. Oh man!
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When BMW released the Concept 4 in 2019 with the inimitable double kidney grille, the concept car that the 4 Series and the i4 are derived from, I thought it was just a cool idea whose looks they had no intention of bringing to fruition, at least not for the non-electric 4 series. I was so wrong. They went ahead with the idea and shocked the entire world and aggravated all BMW enthusiasts on the internet and other weird people. They showed us that they were doing away with culture, tradition and the way things have ‘always been done’. They brought the supposed miscreation to life and to the roads. THEY WERE SERIOUS!
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BMW went for a change of looks which seemingly heralded a change in their department of driving dynamics, which I imagine is a genuine department within the company’s corporate structure (because you don’t make fun cars by accident). The way this fast BMW felt to me was different from how other fast Beemers have felt to me in the past. Where previous BMW’s were not striking to look at, however not unbeautiful, they were striking to drive. With this one, the opposite is the case. The looks are striking but the driving experience is not as salient as I expected. None of this means the coupe is slow.
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I definitely realised that this is no young man’s fast mid-sized BMW coupe as the previous ones may have been. This coupe is all grown up. This may not necessarily be a bad thing, mind you.
As quick as it is, it exudes a different sort of, excuse my French, ‘joie de vivre’. It no longer tries to appeal to the man in his twenties. It understands that the owner has worries and responsibilities. It understands that the type of person who owns it probably has deadlines and other forms of stress.
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It understands that the owner does not want to be ‘at home on the road’ but instead wants to make it to the meeting on time. It gets the fact that the owner has to be noticed by his friends and colleague all while he is as comfortable as possible. That is what it does perfectly.
During my drive I felt disconnected from the road, I felt like I was in my own world. The journey did not necessarily excite me. The cabin feels more like a cocoon and the car does feel a bit heavy and safe, frankly (also due in part to the 4-wheel drive system). The one moment that stood out for me was when I was powering down a banked left curve on the highway, I could feel that the suspension was fighting the cars weight. The suspension wins all the time, however the F30 335i felt way more agile and nimble. This is not all bad though.
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The car glides over bumpy roads. It is quiet and refined inside but it packs the pace when it is called upon. When we drove through Glenwood, in Durban I saw all the heads that were turning in my direction, looking at this unusual ‘beast’, and it wasn’t only the infamous ladies of the night, who have come to be a staple on Glenwood streets who were gawking at me behind the wheel. I felt noticed and respected and that was where the car’s excitement was found. The car is an eye catcher and the shape is gorgeous, no matter what any of us may think of the front grille.
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The car packs all the technology I saw in the G20 3 Series but in a much more appealing coupe shape for me. What I will always appreciate about this BMW is that the centre console does not feel cluttered even for all the features the car has. It is a bit of a pain trying to configure your car on the infotainment system as you drive along but this makes for a beautifully simple and elegant interior. I’m a fan of that sort of ‘soft-life’. This is a grown machine.
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One thing must be mentioned of the coupe - the exhaust note. When I drove the F30 M335i, the exhaust made all sorts of noises. Pops, bangs, snarls, hisses and the rest of that fancy nonsense, but it all sounded synthetic; clearly designed to impress 13 year-olds. This new M440i though! Yoh! It had none of that, just the straight no nonsense sound of a 3 litre twin turbo straight-six engine bellowing out a loud satiating noise that reassures you that we are moving when you press the accelerator pedal.
Not a word of a lie, the noise put me in mind of the old original baby-performance Beemers; the e30 and e36 325i and 328i that were popular among the young men in the 80s and 90s. It reminded me of the original ‘Ithemba lama humusha’ – the hustler’s hope. What a tribute!
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This iteration of the mid-sized coupe is definitely grown up but I do think it was trying to tell me that the people who fell in love with it back in the day have also grown with it. The question is; what harm is there in that?
