1M European Delivery Journal + Pics

[djafactor]

     Featured on BIMMERPOST.com

First a little back history on me. I'm a 33 year old with a borderline crazy passion for all things BMW. Started when our family first moved to the US in 1989. I was 11 years old and caught a glimpse of a boxy sports car from the back seat of my mum's Honda. The boxy shape belonged to a red e30 M3 and I was immediately hooked. e30 M3 posters adorned my walls and I knew someday I would have this car.

My first purchase upon college graduation in 2000 was a Brilliantrot Red '88 M3. I joined my local BMWCCA and started on my road to BMW bliss with DEs and club events. Drove the M3 as a daily for 6 months constantly spending on upkeep before picking up a Acura Integra Type R as a daily. A MINI Cooper S was next in the cards and when I moved to Montreal I could only take one car and had to part ways with my beloved M3.

The MINI was a great driver, constantly on the track. Led to another one that took on many mods but the M3 was constantly in my mind. I eventually found a prime example in 2006 and my mint Lachilber Silver '89 M3 has been with me ever since.

I almost pulled the trigger on a 135i a few years back but was certain that an M version would come about. So glad I waited and when the 1M was announced rushed to my local dealer in April to leave my deposit.

Fast forward to 9/6, my father and I boarded our plane heading for Munich to begin the ED adventure I'd been dreaming of since I was a kid. My father turned 65 yesterday and for him the trip was an absolute surprise as he had no idea I was taking him let alone getting the 1M. He tried to order one for himself but unfortunately was too late at his Indiana dealership.

Day 1:
Arrived early morning and took the tram to downtown Munich. Walked the streets exploring the sites and taking back beers at the various biergartens.

Day 2:
What an amazing day! The delivery at BMW Welt was unbelievable! A stunning building that wraps you in luxury making one feel so special. My father and I arrived at 8am and toured all main floor atrium exhibits, taking in the vast space. 9am was delivery time so we went straight up to get all the paper work done. While grabbing breakfast I could see my car in the lower delivery atrium. Nice way to enjoy a latte, talk about excitement!

Met with Krasten for delivery and walked down to the lower floor, I was so taken back by the car that I just stopped talking and was staring for a good 4-5 mins. My father was laughing with Krasten.

Once delivery was completed we took our victory lap and exited down the ramp to meet up with a couple of BMW interns for the M-Studio visit. The guys were true enthusiasts and walked us through the offices to the design studio. We passed the garages where there were tons of camouflaged test mules, New M6, M5s etc. CRAZY!

We first met with the head of M! Brian Watts. Great guy who spent an hour with us talking about M, the 1M car, and the direction that BMW M wants to go. Amazing! He personally showed us some ultra rare M's. M3 GTS, M3 CSL, M1, 1M Safety car, New M5 Safety car, e36 M3 GTR. Started up the 1M safety car with Aprokovic exhaust...OMG we were giggling like school girls! Brian has a ton of enthusiasm for M and practically guaranteed that the 1M would be a classic.

An hour later Jurgen Schwenker arrived. He was one of the leads on the 1M development. This guy is the man! He is even quoted in the 1M official brochure! A great guy, so funny and animated, cracking jokes with tons of insight. 15 minutes into the conversation he said "Follow me" and took us to the garages to show us the 1st 1M test mule. This was the actual first car that they hacked together when starting the project (I remembered it from early spy pics). He then went on to detail what they did and how they did it. So many details I could write a book, this car certainly is one of the most special cars that M has every produced. The thing that I loved from the meeting is how he showed genuine love for the car and you could tell he has a lot of great memories from the project. Jurgen specializes in brakes at M and said that they worked on the development before and after work hours with a team of about 20 total.

Now for the most important bit... Sharpie in hand, Jurgen signed the underside hood and dated it! Took some pics, I was so excited I couldn't even concentrate. In all he spent about an hour and a half with us, showing personal pictures on his iphone while telling stories about when he was the driver for the marketing pictures and videos.

We then took off for Innsbruck on our way to drive the Austrian Alps. Car is more than I imagined, On the autobahn we hit 200km/h! Took Jurgen's advice that I need to be gentle, "like I'm driving a hot supermodel", for around 500kms then to go all out.

Overall, what an amazing day. I definitely did not take enough pictures as I was so overwhelmed at everything that was going on. Also didn't get a chance to talk more with the bimmerpost guys I met, again just too much smiling to think...lol.

What a day, what a car!!!

Day 3:
Took off from Innsbruck with a goal to drive the Grossglockner pass. Passed through the Geslar Pass which is a tight twisty road through lush green mountains. The views are stunning and we were constantly stopping as we climbed. Had a nice lunch in one of the small towns near the Falls and headed to Zel am See. Zel am See is a small lake town with lovely views. Took a beer and walked the pedestrian streets before heading south towards the Grossglockner. What a road! The 29 euros was more than worth it. The climb starts with fast roads through the forest as you climb towards the clouds. As you reach the various summits the land turns barren rock with a completely different driving experience. The posted 100km/h speed limit allows you to tackle the road as quickly as you feel comfortable and you are in total driving bliss. We were pretty fortunate to hardly have any traffic thus able to drive fairly quickly We headed back to Innsbruck to be greeted by a outdoor wine festival. Took back a few glasses while mingling with the locals before stumbling to bed.

Day 4:
Took the highway through the South Tyrol mountains. Hi-speed driving with amazing views brought us to Bolzano Italy. A nice town with so many walking streets. We were greeted by a Beer festival going on and took back a few enjoying the bands and soaking in the sun. Explored some unbelievable residential roads in the hills of Bolzano with sweeping curves that gave spectacular views of the city below. My father and I were giddy taking turns driving back and forth up and down the hills. We then headed to Stelvio climbing from the tight and narrow east side. Very intimidating road as it is so narrow and tight with tons of bikers whizzing up and down around you. We actually got 3/4 way up before we realized we were almost out of gas. Had to turn back around and head back down into to town. The gas station is actually 15km from the start of the ascent which was a bit stressful as we were running on fumes. The climb back up was unreal. The road was very busy so not as enjoyable as the grossglockner but the alpine views were out of control. At the top were many bikers and sports cars. We counted at least 15 Lotus elises. We descended down the west side and the road down was amazing. Way better then the east but the views were not as nice. Half way down we ran into a Miata parked on the side, the guy flagged us down and started asking about my car. The conversation was fairly limited as he was German but we both understood the passion. He took off and I followed him down at a pretty quick lick. We were the only ones going down and tore up the corners grinning from ear to ear. This was probably the most memorable drive of the trip. We drove to St-Moritz Switzerland, taking a hotel in what ended up being a yuppy and dead lake town.

Day 5:
Drove the Furka and San Bernadino Pass. Glorious alpine driving through clouds in a mix of high speed and tight turns. We ended down in Andermatt before taking another pass to Lucerne stopping at a rock side waterfall. Lucerne was a beautiful ski town with tons of riverside restaurants and walking streets.

Day 6:
Headed to Stuttgart detouring through some of the B500 route. An amazing route through the black forest. Spent the evening around the city centre drinking beer and eating amazing turkish food.

Day 7:
Explored the amazing Mercedes museum in the morning before taking off for the Ring. We were able to do the 3 hour trip in less than 2:30hrs averaging 180km/h and getting up to 225km/h on occasion. The tourist session was only open for 2 hours so i bought a 4 lap ticket and headed out. Words cannot describe the green hell. A lot to take in as you pass slower cars and vans while watching your mirrors for bikes and cars whizzing by with no regard. My 4th lap was the most relaxed, I have no idea of the time, but will have the memories of experiencing the karosel for the rest of my life. We then rushed out to Frankfurt reaching our hotel late for well needed sleep.

Day 8:
Headed to Frankfurt airport early, parked the car, checked in, then headed to the drop off location. Took about 15mins and then taxied to the airport for our flight home.

Overall the trip was amazing to experience with my father. We bonded on such a different level and I got to know him in a new way. We will always have this trip to remember which is priceless.

To get around I downloaded the Europe TomTom app for my iPhone 4. With the belkin mount it was flawless. So easy to use never leading us wrong. It was $119 but so worth it. The mountain passes we drove all felt so different. Tight twisters to high speed smooth curves with various degrees of incline and camber. The car was better than I could have every imagined. It is worth it to drive as many as you can. The power was instant and I never experienced lag. Passing cars while climbing mountains was an instant squeeze of the throttle. I always put the car in MDM & Sport mode to allow a bit more wiggle from the rear and preferred the throttle response. Well done BMW & M for building this car. I'm so looking forward to parking it next to the e30 M3.

Big thanks to my dealer BMW Canbec & BMW Canada for setting this up the M-Studio meeting. Also an extra big thanks to europe for giving us such great beer!

Full Flickr of all the pics here

Some of the good ones, enjoy...

[elitt13]

nice pics !!

thanks!!!

[SNOOPY11]

Beautiful! Thanks for sharing!

[violinfather]

Wow! Fantastic pics.

[JasonCSU]

Wow, some pretty sweet shots in there and one particularly funny one. I never get tired of seeing Euro Delivery pictures.

[M3 Adjuster]

I enjoy these also... it's nice to get more background on the locations and areas... but I also know it takes a lot of time to do this. Lots of great shots of your Dad on flickr.... I am sure those will be treasured for years to come. .

[lazytrax]

wow.. great pictures man! thanks for sharing.

[///1M]

I like how you slipped that picture in there.

[masti99]

Congrats! Awesome pics

[DooBs]

wow straight up pornography

[eeghie]

Prettiest 1M ED picture collection so far. THX for sharing!

(///M Studio visit in October; hope I also get to interact with the engineers in their natural habitat)

[spoon]

Outstanding pix.Thanks

[flzrider]

Originally Posted by eeghie

Prettiest 1M ED picture collection so far. THX for sharing!

(///M Studio visit in October; hope I also get to interact with the engineers in their natural habitat)

When in October? I pick up my 1M in Munich on Oct. 10th.

How does one go about requesting a tour of the M studio?

[1mGator]

Awesome trip, awesome pics (wow you spent dome post processing time) but you forgot the NSFW notice ...ha, ha ... Mooooooo!

[robertm]

What did you use to take the pics? The depth and richness of color is amazing. Looks like something out of a magazine.

[LuuZ]

WoW wonderful pics, have fun !!

[MPBK]

You are a very lucky man.
Congrats.

[djafactor]

Thanks for the compliments! I'll detail the trip in more detail in the original post today.

I'm super happy with the pics. This was actually the first time I traveled without my DSLR and used my new Fujifilm X100. It's a retro style body with a fixed 23mm lens. Shot everything in full manual mode RAW and did some quick post processing in aperture. The hi-res files are amazing.

ED is must add to everyone's bucket list

Cheers

Amit

[Dackelone]

Very nice photos Amit. Especially your Flickr ones.

[djafactor]

Just updated with a full trip report.

thanks

Amit

[oldBMWguy]

Super story-- super pics!!-- Tks for sharing !!...

And I can't wait until I get My AW one in Oct [but will pick up at the PC in South Carolina, not ED]

[M3 Adjuster]

Originally Posted by djafactor

Just updated with a full trip report.

thanks

Amit

Thank you sire!

So awesome that you own both an E30 M3 and a 1M. I sold my track rat (and second E30 M3) to get my 1M... but I am sure I will pick up another one day...