SUBSCRIBE TO THE
MAGAZINE NOW
Facebook-f Instagram

Pebble Beach and BMW remember the legendary 3.0CSL

17 August, 2015

For the 2015 edition of Pebble Beach’s Concours d’Elegance, BMW has come up with something very special with the world premiere of the BMW 3.0 CSL Hommage R — a car that celebrates both the 40th anniversary of BMW in North America and the heady racing success of the BMW 3.0 CSL in 1975.

1975 was the year the Bavarian manufacturer founded BMW of North America — its first official sales company outside Europe. It was also the year in which BMW Motorsport made its debut in motor-racing stateside — in the IMSA series — with a specially made BMW 3.0 CSL. Just a few weeks later, BMW recorded its first historic triumph at the 12 Hours of Sebring. This was followed by a succession of victories, including one at Laguna Seca — just 15 miles from Pebble Beach.

““Both inside and outside, the BMW 3.0 CSL Hommage R is primarily a reflection of its function,” explains Head of Design BMW Automobiles Karim Habib. “The exterior and interior design is based around the requirements of motorsport as far as the car and driver are concerned; aerodynamics and driving dynamics on the one hand, the most direct connection between driver and machine on the other. In my view, that’s something the Hommage car expresses in a very emotional way. At the same time, all the details from the BMW 3.0 CSL are present in the Hommage model. And they are all there to be discovered in their original form. It’s a bow to the 1975 car.”

Every detail of the Hommage car has its origins in the successful racing machine from 1975, but all have since been updated and integrated technically into a modern design language. The colours and graphics used, not to mention the addition of a number 25, reference the extraordinary record of success notched up by the works BMW 3.0 CSL in 1975. Indeed, the BMW 3.0 CSL Hommage R even revives details such as the ‘Bavarian Motor Works’ decals on the windscreen and rear window. Swathes of exposed carbon fibre spotlight the 1975 model’s commitment to lightweight construction and, as a cutting-edge material, help lift it into the modern era.

The writing on the wall

25 September, 2026

Deven, a digital content producer in his 20s, says it was the rear-drive Nissan and Toyota drift cars that fired his imagination in his not-so-distant youth and soon had him wanting one of his own. However, like most of us, he had to start in something less glamorous – in his case, a 1997 Mitsubishi Galant. After that, he bought a four-litre V8 1991 Toyota Soarer, a big change from the Mitsubishi.
“It was my daily driver, and it wasn’t that bad to run back when petrol was affordable,” he says.
When he got fed up with filling it up, Deven bought a 1989 Ford Laser sedan, a 1.3-litre five-speed manual, to be his daily driver. It’s in very good condition, bought from a careful older driver, and he still runs it – although he will occasionally also drive the latest in a series of Nissan Laurel sedans. His current one, from 1993, has done the lowest number of kilometres yet, at 183,000. It has the single-cam version of the engine in his Skyline.
“I’ve had four different versions of that car. It was just a car I always liked. It’s really comfortable, quite luxurious. I bought it from a 90-year-old in Hamilton. It’s in mint condition, and everything is standard.”

The actual Formula One

18 September, 2026

Seeing, in a shed in Hamilton, New Zealand, the Darracq 120 racer that Louis Wagner, also a pioneer aviator, drove to victory in the 1906 Vanderbilt Cup race felt a little like finding a Rembrandt at a garage sale.
For historical significance, I’d say this car ranks with Ray Harroun’s Marmon Wasp, the first Indianapolis 500 winner. Unlike Harroun’s Wasp, which has been lovingly cared for at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame Museum over the years, this historically pivotal machine wound up half a world away from its home in France and, to most of the motoring world, largely forgotten. Sadly, so is the story of how the car got to Aotearoa in the first place.
More often than not, a racing car that is a few years old is regarded as obsolete and relegated to a shed somewhere. As far as racing drivers and team owners at the cutting edge of the sport are concerned, the cars are virtually worthless at that point. They can’t be driven on the street; at best they can be reconfigured for lower levels of the sport, so few people care about them until their historical significance becomes more apparent.