Upon its launch in 2011, the BMW 1M came in for a bit of criticism for being something of a parts-bin car. Take one regular ...

The first is that the 135i is chuffing quick. Its twin-turbo 3-litre straight-six proved potent enough to run neck-and-neck down the long back straight of the South West Circuit with E46 M3s.

The M135i is a brisk, well-built, capable car that no doubt ticks a few boxes on a form somewhere in BMW’s internal documents ...