Difficult as it may be to believe, there was once a time before BMW M->ke546 cars. But that's not to say that there weren't any special BMW->ke178 performance machines, it just means that the ones that did exist were more rare and a lot more special. Such a car was the 1975 BMW 3.0 CSL, nicknamed the “Batmobile” for all the aero bits that were quite unusual for a road car at the time. The car was a homologation special, a very serious race car->ke148 made to be just barely street legal, and it was serious enough as a race car to almost completely dominate the European Touring Car Championship at the time.

The video->ke278 here shows a man whose lifelong dream has been to drive one of these cars finally getting his wish. He gives some important information about the car, but he has purposely waited until the cameras are on to open it up so that we can all see his reaction to the experience of putting the hammer down for the first time. It seems like it must be fun, fun to the point that most of the rest of what he says is just pointless babbling.

1975 BMW 3.0 CSL

Our host gets even more insufferable as the video goes on, but that's okay, because this is a supremely good car. In 1972, BMW was a company looking to move further upmarket. Cars like the 2002 had served the Bavarians well, but the aim was to build bigger, more powerful and more expensive cars, and the motorsport prestige that a car like the 3.0 CSL brought with did a lot toward helping BMW achieve that goal. It is still an odd-looking thing, but you'd be hard pressed to find a gearhead that doesn't think it's beautiful.

You can read our full review here.