This is not a car that lives anywhere near the halfway house. It’s not just an M4 with a fixed rear wing. One clue to that is the price, which is, gulp, double the price of a standard M4. Yup, the GTS costs £120,500. How many will go for that? Well, BMW can answer that question. They’re only making 700 and of those only 30 will make it to the UK. Cautious judgement or another attempt to make an instant classic with a soaring price tag? Your call.

This is a very stripped-out M4 but oddly that isn’t particularly reflected in the weight, despite the carbonfibre panels. But a production BMW with a rollcage shows this is serious stuff. And they’ve found more power, a lot more power. The twin-turbo 3.0-litre straight six engine now has an ingenious water injection system. That might sound vaguely interesting but it is one of the key changes that has pushed power up from a standard 425bhp to a truly stonking 493bhp.

To cope, the chassis has been tweaked, there’s much stronger suspension and the brakes are now carbon-ceramic. And they’ve given it a titanium exhaust. Something you’re aware of when you fire it up. It sounds outrageous, absolutely outrageous. Then you discover that you can switch to Sport or Sport Plus modes and it gets more outrageous still.

Add in the lack of sound deadening in the cabin so you can more easily hear the twin turbos whistling happily while they work, as well as other mechanicals and electronics doing their thing, and your ears will be extremely excited.

As will the rest of you. This thing goes like a race car, simple as that. It’s noticeable that it’s not endlessly adjustable by twiddling dials and knobs. The dampers are passive not active and if you want to tweak them or adjust the ride height then you’d better get the spanners out. But, really, you don’t need to. It’s so strong, so tuned, so ferocious, that it’s perfect as it is.

This is a seriously expensive M4, at the kind of money you might pay for a Porsche 911 GT3. But then it goes like one of those too. BMW have the numbers to back up the front. A standard M4 can get round the Nurburgring in pretty schnell time. But the M4 GTS is a monstrous 30sec quicker, at 7min 28sec. This is a real motorsport BMW.

BMW M4 GTS

Location: Wiltshire

On sale: Now

Price: £120,500

Engine: 6 cyls in line, 2979cc, twin-turbo, petrol

Power: 493bhp at 6250rpm

Torque: 442lb ft at 4000rpm

Gearbox: 7-speed auto

Kerb weight: 1585kg

Top speed: 190mph

0-62mph: 3.8sec

Economy: 33mpg (combined)

CO2/tax band: 199g/km, 36%