Crazy, but not stupid, for pretty much the whole car has been reworked. Hartge specialises in transplanting big hearts into unsuspecting compact bodyshells and knows just how much extra general strengthening has to be added so that the car doesn't fold up like a paper cup. The gearbox is the M5's manual six-speeder, but with a shortened M5 propshaft feeding drive to a modified M3 variable-locking M diff. There's a new, strengthened rear subframe and the suspension has been replaced with Hartge's own sport kit, which is 30mm lower than normal, fully adjustable and incorporates uprated anti-roll bars. Finishing the job is a set of 19in polished Hartge wheels, which at the front expose massive eight-piston callipers and 380mm drilled discs.

However, all that work was nothing compared with the effort that went into accommodating that massive lump of an engine. First there were the mods to the engine bay itself and the relocation of many of the ancillaries (the sump had to be reversed, too); then there was the matter of the steering column, which could no longer follow its normal path. And then there was the ECU. PR boss J