Geneva is a quiet show for BMW, which tends to reserve its big-ticket debuts for Frankfurt in September. When the most prominent car on the stand is the new seven-seat 2 Series Gran Tourer MPV, you know that you're going to have to look elsewhere for excitement.
Or look a bit harder, at least. Because tucked away at the back of the BMW stand was the M4 MotoGP safety car, wearing what has to be about the meanest looking livery ever applied - it looks like the sort of thing you'd send to arrest Batman. So just a track-only M4 in a Darth Vader colour scheme then?
Water injection added to M4; previews GTS tech
Well, no - because the MotoGP M4 has a water injection system, which a very well-placed BMW source confirmed to PH that we'll be seeing in an M car before the end of the year. The forthcoming
M4 GTS
, in fact; which we can anticipate seeing in concept form at the Pebble Beach Concours in August and which will be on sale next year. Water injection is nothing new, of course - Subaru has used it on STI models in recent years - but it's a fresh direction for BMW. Sending a spray of water into the intake charge helps to both cool it and allows fuel to burn more efficiently - both good things - giving a performance boost. There are no more details on the GTS, but on previous form we can safely anticipate it will make the standard M4 look a bit tame.
And some more good news - we're also told that we'll be seeing the eagerly-awaited new BMW M2 before the end of the year as well. So not much at Geneva, but plenty of jam tomorrow.
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