This rumor won’t apply to us in the U.S. even if it’s true, but we’ll enjoy peering over the ocean (again) at what Europeans get to drive. BMW Blog heard BMW’s honchos gave the official “Ja!” to an M3 CS Touring that would debut next summer. A potential bit of supporting evidence would be that long before report on the rumor, Motor Authority published a set of spy photographs showing an M3 Touring Competition on track, the wagon wearing a camouflaged front lip that’s a ringer for the carbon splitter fitted to the M3 CS sedan. That was the only change, the prototype not showing the other CS tells like different grille mesh and yellow DRLs instead of white.
BMW Blog suspects that if the wicked-up wagon materializes, it will be a limited production offering like every other CS, the outlet suggesting no more than 2,000 units for sale. Each one would follow other aspects of the CS recipe, like supplemental boost from the twin-turbos feeding the 3.0-liter inline-six that push output to 543 horsepower and 479 pound-feet of torque, up from 503 hp and 479 lb-ft in the standard Competition. Some extra carbon fiber bits, additional structural bracing, mild weight savings of around 75 pounds should make cameos, too, and perhaps a special launch color.
Countering the odds of this, the highly knowledgeable insider known as yunguldyn on the Bimmerpost forums writes of the M3 Touring, “There will be a single model: Comp xDrive.” Also crimping the odds, BMW M3 Touring is already flat-out and there’s a stacked docket for next year before the rumored entry — not that the crowd buying such cars will protest about waiting for another exceptionally exclusive unicorn.
What we do know about M in 2024 is that there will be a lot of the former in the latter. At least seven new or updated M models are coming next year, including a more powerful M2 that won’t be called “Competition,” mid-cycle refreshes for the M3, M3 Touring, and M4, an M4 CS, and the new M5 and M5 Touring. What M cars won’t do next year is get BMW’s latest iDrive 8.5 and iDrive 9 for some reason, a product planner telling BMW Blog there’s no plan to roll out the new infotainment to the tuned cars nor the 2 Series, 3 Series, or 4 Series. BMW accountants are likely all smiles anyway, the production engineers are likely not getting as much sleep as they’d prefer.
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