The phenomenal gold coupe is the first word of the now legendary BMW Motorsport. They created it before the M Series (or even the idea of it) had time to be born. ‘Slimming down’ everything superfluous helped improve acceleration to a speed of one hundred from 8.2 seconds to 7.3 seconds. A second, when hundredths of a second make all the difference, is a lot. Even more so if you want to have influence in the European Touring Car Championship (ETCC) and rub Ford’s nose in it. In the late 1960s and early 1970s it was the Ford Capri that dominated the ETCC, something BMW was unwilling (or even unable) to look at calmly. In response, an extreme version of the E9 model went on sale, and later – onto the track. Jochen Neerpasch and Martin Braungart, two of the most important creators of Ford’s sporting success, were responsible for its preparation. So, they created a BMW at the price of the Porsche 911. This was, however, not enough. The Capri was still powerful and easier to drive. A special aerodynamic package was a way to improve grip and performance. Armed with it, the 3.0 CSL earned the nickname ‘Batmobile’. The engineers’ efforts paid off and the Batmobile climbed to the top of the sporting charts. A little more about the car itself? This is the first M.

When talking about the three-litre CSL, it is impossible not to mention its roots. Before it appeared, the world saw the phenomenal 2800 CS model in 1968. The BMW 2800 CS owes its beauty to the designers, but also to Karmann, the company that undertook the body manufacturing. It was the bodywork we know from the BMW 2000 CS but modified and livened up by lengthening the bonnet and redesigning the front apron. In 1971, the BMW 3.0 CS and BMW 3.0 CSi arrived at showrooms just months apart. Visually, they were almost identical to the 2800 CS, the distinguishing secret being a larger engine and all-wheel disc brakes.

The lightweight sports coupe that is the 3.0 CSL was, in simple terms, a development of the 3.0 CS. The CSL is short for Coupe Sport Leichtbau. It debuted in May 1971 and initially had the same 180-horsepower carburetted engine, followed by a 200-hp unit with injection 3003 cc and then the 3154 cc engine.

The golden BMW in the photos was built on the 25th April 1973 and is one of the last non-Batmobile BMW CSLs. At any rate, which is what the body numbers indicate, the VIN here is slightly lower than those that fell on the copies with the aerodynamics package. If it is not a Batmobile, why does it look like one? The solution to the mystery lies in the unusual turn of the car’s fate.

The golden CSL presented in the photograph, unsold after leaving the factory, ended up in Italy as the property of BMW. In the meantime, it took on the robes of a Batmobile, prepared not by a home-grown tuner, but by the parent company from Bavaria. Eye-catching not only for its crazed image, but also for its cosmic price, it worked perfectly well as a decoration for one of the BMW showrooms in Milan.

The car remained Milan’s mascot until 1977. At that time, the Batmobile caught the interest of a BMW engineer living in Munich. He bought the unsold Batmobile offered to BMW AG employees at a reduced price, with the addition of a city package. This explains why the first documents with the first registration were not issued until four years after the vehicle left the factory. The engineer drove the racer for nine years. In 1986 he sold it to his neighbour, and so, the BMW ended up on the other side of the fence, where it served until 2014, the year it joined the Bonaventura Classic Collection.

At the time of purchase, the car was in working order and ready to drive. And – one may add – when it comes to provocative speed, this car is a masterpiece. The Bonaventura Classic Collection has a rule: until they bring a car to perfection, it can only be used for normal driving. In this way, the CSL’s odometer has added an extra 20000 km. Fans of rare BMWs may be tearing their hair out right now. What do you mean, such a specimen belongs in the garage? The current owner completely disagrees with this approach and says:

– When I bought it, it had about 200000 km on it, but that does not matter. There are so few Batmobiles – each one has its own history, and it is the history that is more important. Low mileage is what counts with mass-market cars. Then it is what makes it stand out.

Eventually, however, the time came to restore the car. The entire process took five years. It involved stripping the vehicle down to its smallest components, replacing worn parts and taking care of the details.

In 1986, the Batmobile had reached the end of its youth. The second owner decided to modernise it a little. He installed large speakers, a digital radio, new alloy wheels and replaced the wooden interior components with others from… Mercedes. Years later, when selling the CSL, he explained: ’I drove it to the disco, and I wanted to make it appealing to the girls!’

We do not know whether the girls appreciated the upgrades. Certainly, the Bonaventura Classic Collection team did not. It became clear – the Batmobile had to regain its lost image.

Getting the original radio and wooden interior accents seemed not too difficult, but it was! The steering wheel, for example, is unobtainable, So, they purchased authentic BMW wooden elements quite quickly. A workshop in Poland successfully undertook refreshing of the details. Another element requiring intervention was the seats. Their origin was unquestionable (they were factory Scheel seats), but someone had covered them with leather in the meantime. It was impossible to obtain the original striped cloth. The solution was to buy Scheel seats from Porsche, also from 1973. They looked a bit different, but they made the upholstery of the same material, which was a real pain. Once the upholstery had been repositioned, the interior of the BMW again looked as it did in the early 1970s.

Why did they decide to replace the radio instead of simply removing it? We are talking about a car originally not equipped with anything. To solve the riddle, we must go back to when the car went to its first owner. It was then that he enriched its equipment with, among other things, a radio and electric window opener, i.e. to suit the CSI variety. We can reassure orthodox collectors: every removed factory part has safely survived to this day. Both the manual window lifters and the windows themselves lie quietly in the garage. This is because they made the original ones of lightweight plastic to reduce weight. The thin windows were not the only element whose job it was to slim down the car. The others were the bonnet and boot lid – made of aluminium. We should emphasise that every added amenity was the result of BMW’s efforts and was based exclusively on the company’s components. Due to the poor sales of the Batmobile, BMW begrudgingly accepted similar treatments.

One can explain the poor sales of the truly sporty vehicle quite easily. The CSI variety, better equipped and noticeably cheaper, was tempting in the showrooms. The CSL defended itself with superior performance, but this was not necessarily enough for everyone, especially as the model’s legend did not yet exist. Wealthy lovers of truly sporting experience preferred to buy a car from one of the brands more strongly associated with adrenaline, at a comparable price. Fortunately, not everyone did. The car on display is the first one of the 1300 BMW CSL and, at the same time, assembled by original sports air package BMW’s Batmobile. According to the German BMW Coupe-Club e.V., this is exactly the car that appeared in an Italian film, which should come as no surprise. The only thing that comes as a surprise is that it did not play a starring role in it.