The PistonHeads Motoring Week

See here for news other than the M3!

With a weekend launch throwing the schedule out a little, the BMW M3 excitement has been carried over to this week. There's still a video imminent also...

Elsewhere we've had new hot hatches, a big surprise from Jaguar and more details on a few PH events that promise to make this summer another belter. Catch up on everything below.

Black on black for a sinister M4

The magic number
At last the new BMW M3 has been driven, and proven itself to be a car entirely befitting of the iconic name. Now of course there's the anticipation ahead of the car's arrival in Britain... Following the review, it only seemed appropriate to give the F80 a POTW slot, and Chris has contributed his thoughts ahead of the video. See Dan's M3 v C63 blog as well.

Moreover, the PH M4 is in build and should be ready in a matter of weeks. We'll keep you posted on that as it should be a very exciting project. And for an alternative take on the fast 3 Series, see our Alpina D3 review.

There's one more fast saloon of note with a 3 in its name also, and one that you may not have expected. Audi has shown the A3 Clubsport Quattro ahead of its Worthersee unveiling and mighty exciting it looks too. Don't expect to see a 525hp A3 saloon in your local Audi dealer soon, but an RS3 certainly seems plausible. It was our second quattro fix of the week with an Integrale versus Quattro Foes Reunited on Tuesday.

Because the best fast Renaults have Speedlines

Hardcore
The letter 'R' is inextricably associated with fast cars; RS, Type R, GSR, just plain R. This week we've seen three R-branded performance cars that promise to be rather special indeed. Alright, so the bewinged Porsche Cayman may not actually be an R (others have rumoured GT4) but, regardless of the name, it should be brilliant. The Megane RS275 is Renault's riposte to the SEAT Leon Cupra, with a host of trick parts from Akrapovic, Ohlins and Michelin. Following that, as if by magic, pictures began to surface of the next Civic Type R (again). Now it's testing with the Mercedes A45 AMG, just in case Honda didn't come across as serious enough.

It was a case of hello, goodbye and welcome back elsewhere. Aside from the furore associated with the M3, BMW added a pair of new 2 Series models, Cadillac announced the final CTS-V of this generation and, in one of the week's biggest surprises, Jaguar confirmed production of the last six E-Type Lightweights.

2,000 miles in two months!

Team PH Speaks
So what has there been to chat about aside from the M3? That new Lamborghini for a start; see Dan's observations about the iffy rev counter here. His 'Forget the Facelift' TMIW has already attracted over 160 comments so is well worth a look.

Other than that, Matt's filed his first Fleet report on the Caterham Seven and Chris has finally resolved his S4 gearbox problem. Keith's addiction to rare Italian metal shows no signs of abating either with his current object of fascination a Thema 8.32. Shed has been drawn in by an old Merc and our PHer Dream Garages are here and here.

Finally with summer on the way, there are a couple of events to draw your attention too. Full LM Friday Service details are confirmed, and PistonFest is well on the way as well.

Coming soon: