If it has always irked you that BMW has never built an M3 Touring, tremendous news is filtering out of Frankfurt, where Alpina has revealed its latest B3. It's based on the current G20 3 Series but was displayed in glorious, oh-so-green Touring format. Alpina reworks the turbocharged 3.0-litre straight-six engine, the eight-speed ZF gearbox (which it rebrands as Switchtronic), the BMW's xDrive AWD, the adaptive suspension and the limited-slip diff, all to its own tastes, and then gives it the usual stunning styling cues, like 19-inch (20s an option) 20-spoke alloy wheels, an Alpina-branded front splitter and quad exhausts at the back. There's also a gorgeous cabin with top-notch leather and distinctive stitching, as well as blue-faced dials for the digital instrument cluster. Power is up to 462hp with the back-up of 700Nm, and while no 0-62mph time has yet been quoted, we'd expect it to run low fours, as Alpina does say it'll run beyond 186mph where possible. We do know that the B3 Touring returns 28.8mpg with 224g/km CO2, and that order books will open in 2020 with the first cars reaching the lucky, lucky, lucky customers midway through next year.
Matt Robinson - 10 Sep 2019