[Shinkaze]

I was hesitant to go xDrive on an //M car. My previous Nissan GTR and E46 M3 were as different in personality as one could imagine two cars to be, and further still from the E39 M5 that I loved as well.

But then one day I decided to trade in my RWD M340 to test drive an M2. Couldn't find one on a lot, so I sampled the M3 instead and left the lot with an xD :-)

OMG I loved the AWD, and loved even more that I could toggle it on and off. I've often said that RWD mode feels like what a modern E39 M5 could have been, and AWD feels like what a BMW take on a Nissan GTR would be.

But in the back of my mind, I still miss the crap out of my old E46 M3. (My cruiser E46 325Ci convertible is no replacement for that E46 brattiness.) So I have to admit, I still find myself eyeing the M2 from time to time. I dig that chonky DTM look, and as a 2-door, the M2 size fits me more than the M4 (which is about as big as my old GTR!).

So I've been eagerly awaiting the M2 CS to see if they add xDrive, and thanks to R44, I just saw a video of what an M2 CS could be.

Basically, Tom Ripley Motorsports took the front end, wiring, and programming off an xDrive G80/82 and swapped it into a G87. I didn't think that a shadetree mechanic swap would be much better than a drag car, but then they took it to a track and knocked 5 seconds off a 50-second lap time comparing RWD to AWD back to back.

Wow, just wow......

So yeah, this video has me convinced that if a tuning shop can knock that much time off a lap by converting the Competition xDrive to an M2, then the new M2 CS is likely going to do the same. I mean, they're not claiming it's going to be an M2 CSL, so we'll see, but after this video, my money is on //M division going xDrive across the board....

DRIVING THE WORLD'S FIRST X DRIVE G87 M2 (0-60, Road & Circuit Tests!)