BMW M1

The M1 was BMW's one true mid-engined production sports car until the i8 arrived decades later, and it began a troubled, fascinating life. Styled by Giorgetto Giugiaro at Italdesign and developed with help from Lamborghini, it emerged in 1978 as the first car built by the newly formed BMW Motorsport division.

Under the rear deck sat a 3.5-litre M88 straight-six making 273 hp, in a body that weighed about 1,290 kg. Racing plans were repeatedly upset by shifting regulations, so BMW improvised the Procar series — a one-make championship that ran alongside Formula 1 and was won by Niki Lauda in 1979 and Nelson Piquet in 1980, putting grand-prix drivers in identical M1s.

Only 453 were built between 1978 and 1981. Commercially it was a near-miss; historically it's the seed of everything the M badge later became.