BMW took roughly 6,000 kilos of XM Label Purple to the Pikes Peak Worldwide Hill Climb (PPIHC) this yr, aiming to interrupt the file for an SUV run up the mountain. Rhys Millen set that file in 2018 behind the wheel of a 2018 Bentley Bentayga, taking 10:49.9 to cowl the 12.42 miles and 156 turns by nearly 5,000 ft of altitude acquire. Matt Mullins, who’s additionally the pinnacle teacher at BMW’s Efficiency Driving College in South Carolina, can be driving the #728 XM Label Purple on behalf of BMW Motorsports. Closing the circle, Mullins requested his good friend and fellow stunt driver Millen to come back on board as program director. Millen obliged.
We should always observe that in 2022, Pirelli take a look at driver Simone Faggioli roared up the climb in a Lamborghini Urus in simply 10:32.064, however that run occurred in August, two months after the occasion. The PPIHC organizing physique naturally solely acknowledges information run throughout the occasion, so Millen’s title occupies a line within the books for now. In reality, let’s observe that Millen’s title occupies a number of traces, because the racer/drifter/stunt driver and all-around good man owns the quickest occasions within the manufacturing automotive, modified electrical automotive, and two-wheel-drive showroom inventory classes as effectively. Millen had set a manufacturing automotive file of 10:18.488 in 2018 driving a 2019 Bentley Continental GT earlier than resetting the file this yr in a BMW M8 as a aspect order to the XM predominant dish, stopping the clock in 10:12.024.
BMW was surprisingly reserved about each efforts, first uncertain if it will take the XM, and saying nothing concerning the XM concerned till a couple of days earlier than the race. Stroll softly and carry an enormous ol’ hybrid SUV and all that.
Or maybe BMW was preserving the mountain’s capriciousness in thoughts; Pikes Peak loves a shock, many ending in crumpled metallic, some ending in fatalities. Seems Mullins’ run fell sufferer to the crumpled metallic form of shock. He went off the skin of a quick sweeper within the first part of the course and hit a tree. Fortunately, he was unharmed.
BMW’s minimize a two-part video concerning the effort that went into the run, for the primary time revealing simply how a lot work the corporate put in. It is a actually cool video, displaying what goes right into a producer effort to show a luxurious behemoth into each a race automotive and a plausible looking forward to a hill climb file. And sure, the editors included the crash footage and the aftermath. Sensational.
Publish-race, BMW of North America issued the assertion, “Sadly, our hopes for a file run with the BMW XM right this moment ended with a race incident. Driver Matt Mullins is disenchanted however unharmed. The main target now’s on repairing the car and planning for one more file try later this summer time.” Half 2 and the tip of the race to the file ought to hit YouTube shortly.
