2023 BMW M2 vs Supra Manuals | Laptimes and Drag Race

You're sweet on comparison tests, and so are we. This is the battle of the manual inline sixes, starting with the all-new BMW M2. It's powered by an S58. It's the G87 chassis code, and yes, it does look like a waterlogged Scion TC. Then you have the F87, the 2018 BMW M2. It's powered by the N55. You may not have been sweet on the styling when it was new, but don't you miss it now. And lastly, you have the Toyota Supra with a manual gearbox, powered by the mythical B58. And yes, it's just a BMW in a Toyota suit. All of these cars are going to be lapped on the same tire, the Bridgestone RE71RS. They're all going to be driven by the same driver, Britt Casey, a pro driver around the same circuit, Autobahn Country Club South, at the same time with the same ambient conditions. You can get driving impressions about how these cars drive both on the street and the track, a tech segment on how the engineering differs between all the vehicles, and a drag race. And all you have to do is sit back and relax. Before we head into the shop, I think it's important we talk about the interior and exterior of each and every one of these cars, starting with the G87 BMW M2. From an exterior perspective, it's polarizing. That's the number one thing you hear about this car. People are either in one of two camps. It's hideous or it's absolutely beautiful. And to be fair to BMW, that's by design. BMW has been trying to push this bold new look across their M cars and flagship models. But what they did improve for the most part is the interior space. It's quieter than the old BMW M2. The materials are of a much higher quality and the seats are better. You get two different seats. You can either get the carbon buckets or these standard comfort seats. And you can option carbon through the exterior. You can get a carbon roof, which helps shave weight. And you can get carbon trim pieces throughout the cabin. It feels like a more expensive place than the prior generation M2. The other thing to bring up is they did not mess with the visibility of this car. It's still excellent. You can see out of the front. You can see out of the back. And it's this nice, airy feeling cabin. The rear seats, while the interior space has grown, the rear seats are a plus and a minus. While apparently there's slightly more legroom, you definitely get less headroom. They've sculpted the rear of this car, so full-size adults may struggle back there. But you still have a big trunk with a folding back seat. And the audio system is definitely a step forward from the prior generation Harman Kardon. The last thing to talk about is the gearbox. The pedal box is easy to heel-tail, but the shifter is still plasticky. But it does have the rev-match function, which is buried in iDrive 8. Yes, the infotainment is running iDrive 8, which means other than the iDrive controller, you have no physical controls for anything. So you have to tip-tap your way through all the functions. The BMW M2 from 2018. This is an F87. And thankfully, again, like all the other cars, it has a manual gearbox. So what do you need to know? Well, from a core usability perspective, it still has the great visibility of the new vehicle. The seating position is still excellent. You sit nice and low. And it's a very usable car with a back seat that folds down and a big trunk. But most importantly, this car gets more headroom from the rear occupants than the new vehicle. The shifter in this car feels a little bit less plasticky, a little less vague. It has essentially the identical pedal box. And most importantly, it has a manual parking brake. This is also running iDrive 6, which means it still has physical controls for the HVAC, the audio controls, the heated seats, the heated steering wheel. This is a far more simple cabin to use and less gimmicky overall. And it doesn't have a giant stacked-on tablet in the center dash area. The other thing I will bring up, though, is the material choice of this cabin and the seats. They don't feel anywhere as premium as the new car, and they don't feel as expensive. This is a noisier cabin overall. But is that truly such a bad price to pay when this is a much less expensive vehicle in the used market? Lastly, the Toyota Supra with a manual. And leave it up to the Japanese to take a German design and improve it. This ZF manual is the best out of the three. With its weighted shifter and more direct linkage, you actually feel something through the gearbox itself. The pedals are easy to heel-toe. And really, the rest of this cabin feels the most like a dedicated sports car, which means it has the greatest compromises. Compared to the new M2, the Supra is absolutely gorgeous. But the problem is the visibility. If you've ever been in a pillbox before, that's what it feels like. You have a really, really narrow front window slat, almost no visibility out the sides or the back. The trunk, while it is a usable hatch, has a relatively small opening. And honestly, there's just less storage in this car overall. It has one of the better usabilities for infotainment. It's an older version of iDrive. And you have physical controls for nearly everything, but there's not a lot of storage in this cabin. And when it comes to the noise floor, it's definitely on the noisier side of things. But with that, I think it's time for us to head into the shop. Since Jack has forcibly put me in too many GM products, I got cataracts. But maybe this car will cure that for me. Well, before we talk about the brand new 2023 BMW M2, the G87 generation, I thought it was important we revisited this car. This is the F87 M2. They built this non-competition M2 from 2016 to 2018. And it's powered by the N55, where later cars were powered by the S55. The N55, notably, Mark, is the predecessor to the B58. However, this is not just any regular N55. BMW wanted to make sure this car was robust. So they took some of the performance technology found in this generation M3 and M4, like a forged crankshaft, forged connecting rods, new cylinder liners, an upgraded sump, and tried to make this motorsports-ready. But before we talk about the rest of the engineering, Mark, tell me about the car. So the predecessor to this really was the 1M. And people were going batshit crazy for that because it was a return to form, the small car, nimble, less bloated. So they got budget, and they're like, okay, now we got a really solid 2 Series. New architecture, modified architecture. What can we do? So they built, of course, an M car out of the 2 Series. And so it takes a lot of what was done in the 1M, and you see in BMW fashion, a little bit bigger, a little bit heavier, more powerful, a little bit softer, less edgy. But again, still a very capable, smaller, compact platform compared to, well, especially modern M cars. So the thing to note, the 1M was built on the E90 suspension architecture. This is built on the F80. So it essentially takes the front and rear axles off of an F80 M3 M4, takes most of the suspension links, obviously retunes it for a shorter wheelbase car. This car weighs approximately in the 3,400-pound range. You can see the weight chart here. It's strut front, multi-link rear, aluminum front subframe with a giant aluminum shear panel in the front for extra body rigidity, steel subframe in the back. The suspension is aluminum strut-based, or aluminum struts that are non-adaptive dampers. Thing to note about the drivetrain, of course, it's the M55, as I already talked about, but it produces in the mid-300 horsepower range. Really, it makes it at the wheels. BMW famously underrated this car. It's a single turbo. There are two different gearboxes in this car. You can get it as a six-speed manual, which this car has, or you can get a seven-speed dual-clutch, an MDCT. Sadly, they no longer make that gearbox. It is excellent, and it puts its power down through a M clutch-based differential. Brakes. The early non-comp cars were four-piston front, two-piston rear. They're built by Brembo, and of course, they are not brake-by-wire. They are hydraulic. With all that said, I think it's time to talk about the new M car. Mark, we're underneath the brand-new BMW M2 2023 G87 generation. You mean the spiritual successor to the Scion TC? So from a body perspective, let's just talk about it. Wait, it's very heavy. It's almost 3,800 pounds with a manual. Yes, you can lose some weight if you go to full carbon roof and carbon interior, but you're not dropping hundreds of pounds. This is essentially four inches shorter than the current generation M4 and slightly less heavy. And you notice it. You definitely notice it. Compared to the last generation M2, it's almost three, four hundred pounds heavier, and you notice that as well. This is the heaviest car in the test, with the Supra being the lightest. But how do you fix that? You just throw more power at it, Jack. And more tire. So that's how they did it. So compared to the first generation M2, it is wider, it is longer, and it is lower. It's running a much bigger tire. 275 front, 285 rear, 19s fronts, 20s rears. They've gone to adaptive dampers now as standard. They've increased the body rigidity with this generation, but they've also gone to break-by-wire. That's a part of the electric mechanical systems. When it comes to suspension tuning, despite being a slightly shorter wheelbase than the M4 that is out currently, it is supposed to be a little bit more stability for it. So they shrunk the wheelbase, they increased the spring rate in the front to give it a little bit more understeer characteristic, and softened the spring rate in the rear to give it a little bit more mechanical grip. You combine that with an engine, which, just like the B58, is underrated. It makes about 460 wheel horsepower and low 400 foot-pounds of torque. But if you compare that to an M4 competition, it makes way less torque than that car, and you feel it. This car feels less tail-happy. It wants to push before it oversteers. Obviously, it will still do hellacious drifts, but it wants to push first. You fix that with, obviously, either throttle lift or a big boot full of gas. It has an M-Drift analyzer like the current generation M3 and M4, and it has the multi-stage traction control. It's a 10-stage. Which is part of their new electronic control system of break-by-wire. It gives them more flexibility to do these fancy pants like traction control algorithms. Because the car, essentially, just like the old car, front subframe, rear subframe, right out of the M3 and M4. All the suspension links, the basic suspension hardware is identical. So, last thing to talk about, Jack, diff and brakes. Diff, clutch pack-based BMW diff, just like all the other cars in this video, and braking. It is the biggest set of calipers in this test. There's six pistons in the front, four pistons in the rear. They have huge thermal capacity, and they will theoretically stop this car better than all the other brakes in this test. And they do have removable brake duct covers on the wheel well arches. So, for track days, you pull them off and you get more cooling to them. The last thing to note is the engine, of course. While it is essentially identical to what is found in the M3 and M4, it makes less boost. This makes 17, where those cars make closer to 19. But it's still very, very capable. And you have the identical gearboxes, either the ZF 8-speed automatic. So, gone is the dual-clutch. Or you get a 6-speed manual with rev-matching enabled through the headlight. Another Supra, yes. We've done about six videos. You know what this is powered by? I don't know what. A B58, a single-turbo inline-six that is underrated. It makes over 400 horsepower in our testing, and it is deeply, deeply capable. And this one has a ZF manual gearbox that Toyota fiddled with. So, it has a weighted shift knob. It has a specific linkage that they designed. They removed some acoustic paneling. It has a more aggressive final drive ratio than the automatic ZF 8-speed that is in the automatic Supra. And they changed some gear sets, and they have a specific clutch. But this is essentially a BMW ZF gearbox that the Tucumis fiddled with. And it's got a kick up here, so they keep it cool. So, Mark, one thing we're going to talk about before we talk about the chassis and all that other fun stuff, because we beat this car to death, is the tires. So, this car is running 255, 275s. But to equalize everything, as I mentioned in the beginning of this video, they are on Bridgestone RE71RSs. In fact, every single car is on the Bridgestone RE71RS. The M2 is on 275, 285s. It has the most mechanical grip. That is the factory size. This car has 255, 275s, which is the factory size. And the OG M2 is on 255, 275s, which has been upsized due to, really, they didn't have a weird 245, 265 available for that car with an RE71RS. So, we gave it a little bit of a benefit, a little bit of a boost with some more mechanical grip. These tires are really the best case scenario. They are essentially a .R compound with being street legal. They do a better job than the previous tire with its operating range. They seem to get temperature and keep, or actually get to temperature and stay stabilized much quicker than the old tire. And they don't seem to fall off as fast. Or wear as fast, either. Yeah, I mean, they're still noisy. I mean, that's what you expect from, like, an ultra-high performance track day tire. It's not going to be like a touring tire with a 900 tread wear that you get from Farm and Fleet. But the whole concept of these tires is ultimate lap time, getting to temperature, maintaining its grip and stability at high temperatures, much like an R comp. And they're perfect for sprint or track days. With progressive breakaway. And the big thing, too, the reason why we want to run all these cars on the same tire is to remove that variable between the different vehicles. It really is one of the biggest mechanical variables. Although, the argument is this is not the tire that was designed around the suspension and the spring rates and the stabilizer bars and the bushing. But if you're going to track any of these cars, you're going to run a 200 tread wear track. And you're not running the OE tires almost 90% of the time until you burn them up. So the other thing to talk about as well is chassis. This is built on BMW's car architecture, but Toyota went to work with them to make it a dedicated sports car variant. It's still strut front, multi-length rear. It has the prior generation of electronic or electromechanical systems. So it's a hydraulic brake setup. All the cars in this test are running their OE pads and OE fluid. If you are going to run the Supra specifically and the OGM2 hard on the track, you should run a more aggressive or more capable brake fluid and a more aggressive pad. Something like the Countach based garage pads that we've been running. Mike and David have been working with these cars for a very, very long time. And the Supra is very modification friendly. Yeah. Has been proven to be fairly reliable. Yeah, we're not going to go into all the modification stuff. I mean, the sky's the limit. Yeah, it's a rabbit hole. The braking system is something you will have to address. The pedal goes instantly soft if you even run like two sessions on this car. So you definitely have to do fluid and pads. The brake ducts on this car from the front part are open all the time. There is not a removable like block off like on the M2, the new M2. So there's a lot of thermal capacity here. You just have to be smart about it. The body structure. Last thing to talk about is from talking to the chief engineer of this car, they worked with BMW for years to try to get a dedicated sports car platform made. That's what makes the Supra different from the M2s that we're talking about. Since BMW did not have a dedicated sports car platform, they co-developed this with BMW, Toyota and BMW to have something that was just for sports cars, not shared with like the sedans, the coupes. It didn't have to be everything to all people. So that's why this is, it's still car. It's still got all the BMW stuff. The suspension looks identical, although the geometry is different and has been updated for this car. This is more sports car than trying to be everything. At its core, it's a BMW underneath. We're in the newest car here. The 2023 BMW M2. This is the non-carbon edition. So we don't have the carbon buckets, the landing strips. You're going to be bounced around. Yeah, I see. Oh, these seats are not. Oh man, this is perfect for my hemorrhoids. That's why I got these glasses so I can see everything more clearly. I can see your driving prowess in your drift analyzer that exaggerates how long. I think you can show me that I have five stars and I drifted 5,000 feet. Yeah. So Mark, you and I both drove this car. It is the most digital out of all of them, but in some ways you like this better than the other two. Well, it's faster in a straight line. The engine feels like it feels a different generation compared to the two other, the Supra and this. Even though I know you love the B58, this car pulls and pulls. The manual gearbox feels good. There's an immediacy, although synthetic immediacy, to this car. And of course, the big thing is it's got a fake brake pedal. So when you step on it, it's like bam! It feels like you're hitting a wall, even though it's totally over boosted. I don't know. I just like the sharpness of it compared to the Supra and the suspension, all the inputs. I mean, I wouldn't say it's a driver's car per se, the way that it's set up, but it is a lot of fun. It is the most stability oriented of the three. It feels the most connected front and rear. Sadly, some of the character of the old car definitely isn't present, but what makes up for it is obviously the speed and the fact that you can get in and out of corners so effectively and naturally, Mark. If you do have the drift analyzer going, you can slide this thing around. Yeah! Man, that's some serious ****. And according to this, I drifted 162 yards. It's extending your length as usual, the kind of car you like. So, Mark, the one thing I will bring up, though, is the engine. People complain about the six-speed manual. I'm going to be honest, it's not that good. It's average. I mean, it's better than the old manuals. I remember my E92 M3 manual. It felt like I could break that thing in half with my pinky. This is better, but it certainly doesn't feel as good like the Blackwing we just got out of. And even the Supra, it just feels more plastic-y than that. But I mean, dude, you got a manual. It's not horrible. At least it does the job. And out here on track, you don't really notice the long gears. You can carry so much speed. There's so much torque. There's so much power. This is clearly vastly underrated at the wheels. But this car, you know, I think what really surprises me, too, is clearly all these cars are on the same tire. Yes. Do you realize what a proper track day tire can do? How much overhead and grip there is? Like, you know, normally you're like, OK, I'm going to lose the rear end here. I'm going to lose the rear end. And you're like, nope. And this car definitely feels the most stable of the three cars, in my opinion. The back end feels like it's more in shock than the Supra was, where you can feel like, oh, it's going to snap. This car is just really, really progressive compared to the other two. All right, Mark. With that, I think it's time to talk about the Toyota Supra. Let's do it. Mark, do you know what car we're in? I don't know. Another BMW? Yeah, we're in a BMW with a V58, Mark. God. Single turbo engine. And leave it to the Takumis to build the best manual out of all three. They didn't really build it. They just made some modifications internally. Oh, no, they blessed it, Mark. It doesn't matter. It's the steel. It's the best one, for sure. And this car, you know, we talked about this at what I did at the launch, and then we drove the automatic to death. What I really like about this car is that it feels like a driver's car. It feels the most capable. Like, the overhead's really high if you set it upright, but the stock suspension has so much wobble in the front and the back. And then also, unfortunately, because this is on hydraulic brakes, the brakes aren't up to the task in, like, the type of driving that we're doing. So there's a lot of, like, it's a soft pedal compared to the M2 we just got out, which is, like, so synthetic. You never know when it's going. But at least you have an idea of how deep you can brake in this car. Where the M2, just like a brand new CX Z06, you have no idea, really, what the brakes are doing. They're perfectly linear, but you don't have any feedback through the pedals at all. Agreed. How does the front and the rear feel in this car? Obviously, it's very, very willing to rotate. It is, but I think with these tires, it's exactly what this car needs to give you better communication in terms of what the back's doing. It doesn't just feel like the back wants to walk away from you all the time. So I have a lot more confidence to push this into the corners and go 10 tenths. I mean, this is an incredibly fast car. I mean, you can just tell out here, even compared to the M2, the inputs are more linear, one-to-one. It's not as extremely synthetic feeling. And when you're a good driver, I think once you get to the limit of this car, it's amazing. It really is. It's just, I feel like in some cases, it's too much car for most people. But that's great when you're looking at the price tag, because what is this compared to the other car? So the other car, the brand new M2, can be pushed past $70,000. And a manual Supra, if you don't fully opt one out, is in the mid to high 50s. So this car, fully loaded, is definitely cheaper than the M2. I do think, to your point, it is the most difficult car to drive flat out. In some ways, it's the most rewarding. It's the least understeering. And this engine, obviously, joking aside, while it doesn't feel quite as potent when you're on the boil as the new M2, it's still, I mean, it's a phenomenal engine. We know, we've already talked about it. It's underrated. It's smooth. It gets good fuel economy. I mean, the fake engine was awful. But, you know, don't worry about it. I love driving this car, Jack. I think I would definitely consider owning this car with some brakes. Tires like these RE71RSs are amazing. And then I would have to do suspension work to this, just to fix kind of the disconnect. Back and front. We talked about it in the original Z Supra video. I do think the rear of this car is too soft, and the front is too willing to turn in. And if you aren't a keen driver, you could find yourself going backwards into a corner very easily. Mark, does the manual make this more fun? All right, Mark, let's drive the OGM2, the N55 car. Yeah, yeah, yeah! Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah! N55, Mark. Single turbo. Oldest car here. Cheapest car here. Objectively, the least capable car here, potentially. But the most character. It does have a lot of character, and it's partly because the engine doesn't sound like a f***ing synthesizer through the speakers. You know, people give this engine, the original OGM2, a hard time for not being real M engine. But I prefer this N55 to the S55. Sounds better. It's nowhere near as fast, though. This thing is like, it feels like it's 35% slower than the new engine and the S58. Yeah, I mean, clearly the new engine's better, but I mean, this has so much character. So the major thing with this car is it makes up for its lack of speed with the fact that you can kind of feel what's going on. The only negative part I could say is the steering is too fast. So what happens is you turn the wheel, it's overreactive in the front, and it unsettles the car in the back. You turn it in, you're like, why is it so quick? The whole car can't respond, so it snaps the back end around. It's not as linear, the inputs, that way. But for me, I feel like the suspension, at least the calibration of it compared to the other two cars, the front doesn't feel as bobbly, and the rear doesn't feel as bobbly. It feels like things are screwed together tighter compared to the other two cars. However, the negative part is the front end does not work nearly as good as the other ones. If you start to wash out the front end and you lift, it never recovers. You can't get the front end to reconnect. The front end just does not have as much grip, even nowhere on these amazing tires. So you can't overwork the front. You can't lean on the front as much. And then, of course, the brakes are nowhere as strong. Yeah, they're the smallest. This is a heavy car. Yeah. I mean, really, I mean, once you get the front settled, it does a good job, but you can't lean on it as much. And it doesn't, like, it doesn't carry as high of a speed because the front end is washing out versus turning in. I think one of the things I will bring about this car, though, is it has a sense of playfulness. Yeah, right. It always, like, the rear always wants to step out on you, which out here makes it worse. Right. The other two cars, at least the new M2, which is more stability forward, and the Supra, you have to be an idiot for the back end to want to do this hellacious drift all the time. Right. For this car, you give it a bootful of gas, you give it too much throttle in the corners, it will always slide. Won't carry the same drift angle that the new M2 will. It's just, like, liveliness in the back. It makes it a worse car out here, and I'm sure it's the slowest out of the bunch. Yeah, of course. But if you, to be honest as well, if you pay used prices for one of these cars, depending on year and trim and gearbox, you can get into these for the 40s, high 30s. Yeah, that to me is, that's the most compelling part about this car, is it's just quick enough. It's actually fast, but it's not a car I would track. I think because of it, to your point, it's playfulness. Would be a much better suited street car. Decent manual trans. The steering feels connected. The brakes feel real. Like, there's that sense of emotion from the engine. I like this as a street car by far the best out of all of them. More so as a track vehicle, I agree, Mark. But with that, we've talked about all these cars. It's time to see how they lap around Autobahn Country Club South. Sounds good, Jack. I'm in the shop with Britt Casey. He's a pro IMSA driver who was a TCR champion in 2018. We're here to talk about what these cars are like to drive to the absolute limit and discuss lap times. First thing to talk about, though, is testing conditions. We ran these cars in around 44 degree ambient temperature, which means the track was even colder. You see lap time boards everywhere on all these different channels. But the reality is, tests performed on different days lead to different results. You could take the same car one day and run it another day with slightly more rubbered in track, higher ambient conditions. Even with the same driver and the same tire, you're going to see a substantially different lap time up to one to two seconds. So that's the thing to note. These times are all performed on the same day by the same driver, but they're more of a reference point versus gospel. The first car to talk about is the 2018 M2. It is by far the slowest out of all three. And all you need to know from a data perspective is in the main straight, it is nearly 10 miles an hour slower than the 2023 M2. So, Britt, I know this is the slowest car, but you don't drive a lap time. You drive the experience. What's this car like feeling wise? At the limit, I did prefer the feel of the old car over the new one. Yes, it's slower, but I feel like you could learn more about your own driving inputs with the old car. The new one just has a little bit. It's a little bit too artificial with some of the programs inside of it. So I would prefer the old car, even though it is slower. The next car to talk about is how the new M2 compares to the Supra. The Supra was the faster car during our tests. I know talking to you off camera, you think the Supra could have gone even faster and more of the time, at least with you driving, the new M2 will be slower than the manual Supra. How do they drive differently? And where did you make up lap time in both cars? So I think the biggest factor right away would be the weight difference between 400 and 500 pounds. That is a huge difference between the cars. That affects the way it brakes, turns, accelerates, everything. So the brake feel of the Supra being hydraulic, I liked it more than the M2. Also with the weight savings, it slowed down a lot better. You can see in the Garmin data, we were braking later essentially everywhere in the Supra and also carrying better speed through the corner. Now, from a chassis dynamics standpoint, the M2, basically when you brake, you know, you brake a little earlier than the Supra and then you come off the brake pedal and the M2 would almost immediately go to an understeer and then understeer to the apex. And then as soon as you pick up the turbocharged power, it kicks the rear out and it actually oversteers on the exit. So it feels pretty alive there on the exit, but it's pretty dead going into the corner. Whereas the Supra, you can brake later, carry more speed in and then as you release the brake, the outside rear tire feels like it's just continuously rotating through the corner. Whereas the M2 is, you're waiting on the front to grip up again for it to actually rotate at the apex. Whereas the Supra feels like it just has rotation everywhere. It's like a looser car. Yeah, for sure. So it's almost like the M2 is the more accessible car. It has the lower skill floor, but the lower skill ceiling as well, where the Supra has a much higher skill ceiling. You can go even faster in the Supra than you can in the M2, but it's the much harder car to drive, at least if you're not comfortable with a slidey, oversteering car. Much more confidence aspiring in the M2, I would say. You can catch yourself out in the Supra pretty quick. So with that, I think it's time for us to talk about what these cars are like to drive in the street and get into our final thoughts. Final thoughts on the inline six battle, all with manual gearboxes. And I wanted to say this first, huge thanks to Autobahn Country Club. It's a racetrack in Joliet that we've partnered with for many of these videos, and we could not do these comparison tests or track tests without them. And if you live in the Midwest and you want to become a member, learn how to drive from drivers like Britt Casey, or do a track day rental or track day, I highly suggest you hit them up. And it's not just that. If you live in California and you're looking to get out and get to one of the hottest states in the country, Illinois is where it's at. But truthfully, it's not just track stuff. You don't have to be a pro driver. You can drive your own car and have fun. If you just want to do a couple sessions, you can go carting. You know, you can get wheel to wheel competition here. You can race in spec series. So there's a lot to take away from, you know, obviously Autobahn, but that experience is exactly what you need in this modern era. If you have a faster car or a cart. And you really get to experience all the car has to offer. Safely on the street, you can't drive 10 tenths. The other organization we need to thank is Bridgestone. They supplied all of the tires in this video, and we use the RE71RS as a spec tire to eliminate the tire as a variable. It's the perfect performance tire for this type of test because it's on the extreme end of street use, but maximizes everything the car can do on the track. It has almost R-Comp levels of grip with the friendliness, the breakaway characteristics of more of a high performance street tire versus an R-Comp. So it's one of those tires that it's best case scenario. Drive it to and from track. They hold up very well. They don't seem to fall off as fast as the previous tire. It makes a lot of sense if that's all you're doing with a high performance car is track. Dang it, this is the tire to get. And, you know, there are some negatives with it, of course, with like a little bit of tire noise, it picks up a lot of rocks. You know, if you don't track day a car all the time, then you don't need this tire clearly. But it is one of the best street track tires I've ever used. But I can pole position at Whole Foods. The other person we need to thank is Tyler. He's a viewer and he was kind enough to lend us his 2018 M2 where we could track it and slide it around and have our merry way with it. So thank you, Tyler. Thank you, Tyler. It was the first time we got to meet. You know, we don't get to meet a lot of viewers, but him and his fiancee came out with this car. I greatly appreciate it. But I also greatly appreciate the disappointment in their faces when they met us. They're like, man, we thought you'd be Apex Men. Yeah, she's like, oh, I thought you were going to be 6'4". And he's like, man, I thought you were way more good looking on camera. Let's talk about the three cars. You and I have differing opinions on my love of inline sixes and BMW-esque vehicles. Everyone wants to hear you talk about the new M2. Tell me about it, Mark. No, they don't. They don't want to hear this. But I have to talk about it because every single time I got into the M2, of old and new, I've always felt the same way. Like, I can take it or leave this car. I get out of the new M2 as much as, like, it's fast as hell. It's more speed than you can possibly need. It's manual. It's rear wheel drive. But why do I feel nothing when I drive it? Nothing. Like, the steering's dead. The brake pedal's digital. It has fake engine noise. The car is just, it feels like you're not engaged. And when I get out of it, at the end of the day, when I'm sitting there tip tapping on my keyboard, thinking about all the work I got to do, I'm never thinking about that car. I never think, oh, I'd love to take a drive in it. There's just not a lot going for it, other than just the pure fact of price versus performance. There's nothing like it. That's really it. And to me, that's not a compelling enough reason to spend $60,000 plus on a car to not feel any emotion. It's just dead inside because it's all fake now. Well, Mark, maybe you're looking in a mirror talking about dead inside. Yeah, maybe. But the new M2, the strengths are it's fast and it's the best daily driver out of all three of these cars. These cars are not race cars. It's by doing all of our testing on track. If you want to see a pure street comparison, go watch Jacob and Yuri's from the straight pipes. But as a street car, what the new M2 offers is it's quieter than the old car. It has a nicer looking interior, albeit a slightly less usable one. The engine's extremely powerful. It rides well. And it's a car for in the mid-60s you can do everything with. It is a true daily driver sports car that you can post really wickedly fast lap times with and then take it to work. Yes, it's not the prettiest thing in the world, but it's a very compelling street car that you can get with one of these three pedals. And we complain about that all the time. That's the best counterpoint. It really is. It's a great street car. It's just I don't feel anything. Next car is the Supra powered by the B50. Oh, here we go. Tell me about it, Mark. What do you think? Well, it's got a manual. In our previous video, I said, you know, it was just short of that to be a great car. And I will still say that. Although the compromises that it makes to be that dedicated sports car platform, the lighter weight, the interior usability, the fact that it is so compromised as a street car compared to the M2, and you drive these back to back, you're like, oh, ----, now I see why people love the M2 so much. But the Supra is that weekend car. You want a second car. You want to have fun. And it's the best car here for pushing the limits of yourself because it rewards you the most out of all these cars in terms of driving skill. If you can wheel this thing at 10 times, you're going to be faster than the other cars by a long stretch. And it's modification friendly. It's reliable so far. There's a high overhead. And the manual really does. It does take it to the next level of feeling a bit more or a little less generic. I'll put it that way. As a street car, though, it's the worst. You don't have a back seat, a relatively small hatch area, and it's like being in a bunker. You can't see out of it. But the manual gearbox is great. And I do like the danger element of this car compared to the other two vehicles. It's a bit like a skill cannon. We talked about it in the track segment with Britt Casey. It's the hardest to drive, but it's the most rewarding. Similar in the middle in price. You can get one of these in the mid 50s to low 60s, where the M2, the new car, starts in the mid 60s and goes up into the low 70s. The last car to talk about is the OG M2. We picked the M2, the non-competition, because the new M2 is not a competition car. So theoretically, if you got a CS or a comp car, the results might have changed a little bit. What do you think about this car? Albeit, it is by far the cheapest. You can get these things in the mid 40s, almost 50, to the 30s if you don't want a 2018. Yeah, I would just put it this way. You know, if we're talking about the M2, like I complained about the new one, if this car was $60,000, it'd be a totally different story. But it's in here because it shows you what you can get for the lower price, capturing a lot of what makes the Supra great and the new M2 great in a package that you're not in the hole for. And the benefit of it, just because it's a generation old, which is crazy to say, it has a little bit more steering feel. The brake pedal is real. There's no fake engine noise. Less fake engine. Yeah, the engine sounds real. There's induction note. There's exhaust note, even on the stock setup. You can see out of it. You can use it. It doesn't look as hideous as the new car, and I know that's subjective. But to me, it's the winner of this test just based on price. Literally just based on price. You get almost all of the fun of the other cars. Not as fast in a straight line, but you feel more driving it. So with that, Mark, I think it's time to wrap up this video. And thank you all for watching. Can't see. Oh, ----. World just dumped a dump. I think you need to throw these bad boys on and just feel the calibration difference. Oh, yeah. You can finally see. I'm feeling like an alpha. Your lap time just dropped 10 seconds. I feel like the biggest alpha that's ever lived, Mark. Hey, guys and gals, hope you enjoyed the quick video. Any who, I'd love for you to learn about the BMW B58 in future videos. I am dying to talk about it. You should consider subscribing and liking me today. My mom said I am a good boy, even at 40 years old. See you in the chat rooms.