gangzoom

I've never said the M135i is a bad car....I just find it amazingly ugly, so ugly infact I have no interest even to sit in one let alone drive one.....so just call me very vain For the £30k I would much rather have a used 135i and spend £5k on some Birds suspension+Quaife LSD. Picture is my 335 in Switzerland, somewhere up in the mountains is Reichenbach falls where Sherlock Holmes and Moriaty had their final meeting....amazing place, if I spoke German I wouldn't think twice about trying to find a job there

Personally I think the M135i is over rated, I know BMW is not known for their car designs interms of beauty/standing out but in my opinion the M135i is probably one of the ugliests car on the market, its may be a nice car to drive but the drive train is really no different from that of a 135/335i, and both of those options are available for much less than a M135i. Would you want to see this thing parked on your drive first thing in the morning.... or something like this .... [

M6 looks lovely but I really wouldn't recommend running one without a BMW warranty. My lowly 335i has me cost £2-3k in repairs for various bits in the last year, and that mostly minor stuff.....For the equivalent cost of a tank of fuel a months I think a warranty on a M6 is well worth it

I take your point but my 5 does everything I need and i just cannot get my self excited about smart phones any more, they all look the same these days and I just cannot bring my self to waste £££ on one when my 5 is perfectly fine.....plus my 335i needs more work doing at the garage so any spare £££ is been kept for the BMW car maintenance fund

My wife is using our BMW 335i as her daily for the last 12 months. She has no clue about FWD/RWD, and is a she fine with the car. I stick on a set of winter tyres/wheels as soon as frost appears......But in 24 months of driving I managed to collect 1 minor kerb on the wheels now just about every wheel is now kerbed to death

Great car the M3, my mate recently sold his for a 5 series diesel estate

Just priced up a 128gig iPhone 6 plus...£780!!! I'm an Apple fanboy but you have to be mad to pay that much for a phone! To be quite honest I'm pretty unexcited about the new iPhones, bigger screen/better camera it's a bit predictable, but than again what else can you do with phones these days.....will be sticking with my 5 thank you. The Apple Watch though looks amazing, cannot wait to try one, only thing putting me off is the fact it's not waterproof, so cannot use it whilst swimming. If they keep the price down to about £300-350 it's quite bargain, especially when you consider a decent sports watch from Polar or Garmin will set you back £200-300 and they have 1/4 the functionality of the Apple Watch. I'll be amazed if I have enough self control to not buy one when it comes out

Any idea of when the new XF is due Had the wife half sold on the idea of pre-ordering a brand new XE but the design just doesn't stand out enough for us to justify spending nearly £30K on one.....hope it sells well though, by the sounds of it alot of money has gone into developing it.

Been patiently waiting for this car for a few while now....have to say I'm pretty under whelmed, the design is really conservative and as my wife points out, it doesn't look any more exciting than our 6 year old E90 BMW 3 series. ....infact if anything the E90 has a nice rear/boot proportion compared to the XE. The Mazda 6 looks more exciting. ...and the central console looks like it was designed for the 1990's. Sorry Jag, it may have cost £1.5 billion to develop, but its all bit too conservative interms of design to really distinguish it from the German barges, certainly no where near as nice as the XF interms of design......and a starting price of £27K is pretty high, I know the equivalent 3 series has the same RRP, but how many people actually pay the RRP on a 3 series So the search for a replacement to our Civic goes on, certainly in now not in any hurry to get a XE.

Sounds like a fab trip, am already planning our next driving holiday Sad to hear your 'ring experience, glad at least the damage to the wallet was bearable. I seriously considered taking my car to the 'ring but after finding out no one would insure me to do even one lap in my own car gave up on the idea....and after reading your experience quite glad I did end up the 'ring!!

Charities are a moral mystery to me, things like the air ambulance service and LOROS cancer care need charitable funds to run (pay people salaries), but surely these services should be state supported. People are happy to pay £5-10 to charity but how many people are happy to pay a extra 1-2% on income tax?? Research into diseases like ALS is incredibly complex, and not doubt extra funding will allow more research to be done, but actually any drug developed will like be so expensive that it will almost certainly not be available on the NHS. So is spending X amount on researching a rare disease better than spending the same amount on something more common like dementia? Whilst at the same time virtually every single hospital I have worked at is short staffed and struggle to deliver the best treatments due to resource constants. So what's the point of developing new treatments when we already struggle to fund basic clinical care?? The point is we all have opinions, but at the end of the day we're all hypocrites, it's called been human. I never trust anyone who thinks they know everything. For me raising awareness for any charity is a good thing, but for me I really cannot see how tipping cold water on your self is any form of a challenge....Infact some of my crazy mates jump in ice cold baths regularly post training runs. But if people want to do it why not?? The whole wasting water thing is a joke, in the west we waste so much water/food/fuel compared to the rest of world it's beyond belief....

Come to think of it, I don't think we saw a single 'M' sign around the Alps region

Thanks for all the comments!! It really was a unforgettable trip, and we really count our selves lucky to have been able to do it!! Though showing the wife photos off the forum from other people who have done a similar trip really helped to convince her . I did try to push my luck and get Monza GP + the 'Ring into the itinerary, but cannot really complain Have to say when I first saw a photo of the Grimsel Hospiz it wasn't very impressive, but when we arrived and I saw where it was located I couldn't believe they had managed to build a hotel there. The drive up to the hotel The view from our room!! ...and the road leading away from the hotel Apart from the roads, the rest of Switzerland was pretty amazing... But the Gelmer Funicular was something I've never experienced before, 106% gradiant, 1800meters ride, literally through the clouds!! ...where at the top you find this!!! We've been to some amazing places in the world, NewZealand, Great Wall of China, Taj Mahal, Grand Canynon, Niagra falls but Switzerland trumps all of them by a MASSIVE margin...and best of all it's so close to the UK compared to else where. It's now a definite regular holiday destination, I just cannot believe it's not better promoted in the tourism world.

Just got back from our European road trip, thought I share some photos. Day 1: Leicester to Bern: 700 + miles!! Motorways all the way, nothing exciting or too taxing. Day 2: Bern to Meiringen: 50 miles. First real taste of what Switzerland has to offer, and it's pretty breathtaking. Day 3: Bern to Guttannen via Mount Titlis: 120 miles. 2 Major passes, Grimeselpass and Sulsten pass. Driving the passes was amazing, the Sulsten pass in particular was the most scenic. Tunnel Day 4: Guttannen to Stelvio 156 miles. 4 passes: Grimselpass, Furka pass, Via Alpasu, Oberalp pass, Ofen pass. The Furka and Grimsel were stunning, more for the scenery rather than anything else. For pure driving the the Oberalp and Ofen was more fun. Grimsel pass Even my wife had to admit it was a pretty impressive bit of road. Unbelievably beautiful in parts, and we were lucky enough to stay in a hotel build in the middle of it all. The join between Furka and Grimsel Furka pass proper, yes that's a glacier in the background. Day 5: Stelvio, Umbrial pass, Ofen/Fluela pass, Oberalp pass, and than on to Spa Stelvio is an engineering feat with 47 hair pins, but to be honest not the prettiest or nicest pass of the trip but at 2750m above sea level the highest. Interms of driving the Umbrail pass next to Stelvio was prettier and nicer to drive on. Trip than took us to Spa. Eau Rouge is a sight you have to see in person to appreciate its magnificence. We came for F1, but the guys in GP2 were just mental, overtaking at Eau Rouge in the wet....why not!! But F1 cars are still the stars of the show On TV you really cannot appreciate just how close the racing has been this year!! Every corner at this track looks amazing So in total, over 2000 miles of driving, 6 different borders crossed, and an experience I can recommend to anyone who loves cars/driving.

Not at all into the social media stuff, but been able to display OBD info such as speed/mpg etc looks cool. Been a geek I found the pre-order price is too tempting to resist

Losing 8kg in 3 weeks is frankly amazing!! At one point I weighed nearly 90kg (and going up), than I decided to do something about it. My weight is now steady at 70-75kg, and my BMI is 22.5, so pretty much in the middle do the normal range, but it has taken me 2 years to loss 10-15kgs, so your doing amazingly well!!! Keep it up!! But the key is to try and change your whole lifestyle, and not just focus in on a diet which you cannot maintain in the longterm. I notice there was some debate about fitness videos, we've been doing T25 recently, it's the same as Insanity but shorter. I agree it's aimed at people with half decent baseline fitness, though clearly they aren't to say that in the video, otherwise they'll have no customers. The works outs are good though, just for fun I recorded my HR during a double T25 session, average HR was about 125, which is a decent cardiovascular work out but by no means overly stressful. But compared to my normal 5k training run, when my HR average is about 160, traditional cardiovascular exercise still works your body much harder, I've seen HR of 180 when really pushing it on the bike!! Though T25 is very time efficient, since you can do it just about anytime of the day, and it literally only takes 25 minutes, and any exercise is bette than none.

Good luck with the M135i, though I wouldn't hold your breath about it been more reliable than the 370Z. As soon as I've fixed one problem with my 335i another appears, currently leaking oil (again)...and we're in Belgium for Spa. When it's working it's a great car, but now am very tempted to traded it in for something that doesn't break every 2 weeks. Golf R looks like a half decent idea.

Misty = Cloudy. Visibility went from clear to 20 meters in seconds. Simply what happens when your driving at clonus level, simply amazing experience

Enjoy the trip. We did this yesterday, it's a magnificent road... But the Umbrail Pass just beyond it beats it for scenery, and driving fun!!

So we did the first proper Alpine passes....Both of us are pretty much in agreement this place is by far the most beautiful we've been to anywhere in the world, including the likes of NewZealand, China, India. Yes there's lots of traffic but what a view, why would you want to rush anywhere when the scenery is so amazing!!

We're currently on day 3 of our trip around the Alps....hitting the proper passes for the first time later today, cannot wait

I've done training for long distance (100miles+) bike rides, marathons, and currently training for my first triathlon. I've never ever taken any protein shakes/creatinine/recovery drinks. If your doing a cardiovascular heavy exercise regimes carbohydrates is what you need, and lots of it. Personally I rather get my carbs from eating real food than weird tasting gels/bars/drinks. Creatine is simply another way your body stores energy, your body produces it naturally from 3 basic amino acids, muscles uses it as a store for energy (ATP) and it is than removed from the body via urine. The scientific evidence for things like creatine supplements is very thin at best, but in sport even a small psychological edge is a good thing so I suspect that's why protein drink/supplements are so popular.

We definitely don't want anything German, I really do like the sound of the XE....shame it's still not going to be announced for a months, and wouldn't be on sale till next year. Still more time to save up for a fully loaded one.

Mazda is out, she doesn't like the look, think I'll wait and see what the XE looks like. Suppose if we get a new one with warranty and than extend the warranty that should sort any issues out.

Thanks for all the suggestions.. Car is mainly for the wife and she has no interest in performance, she just wants something economical, reliable, practical but a bit more luxury inside than the Civic. The IS300H is top runner at present, will wait and see what the XE is like but the Mazda 6 looks interesting too, over 70 mpg and pretty cheap in comparison....Lets see what she thinks