Alpina’s M5 – official

Keep em' waiting and they'll love you more, right? Well, not if Alpina has anything to do with it...

Like a support act trying to keep the audience warm, Alpina has unleashed its M5-rivalling B5 saloon, to ‘fill a gap' before the real deal arrives next year.

And you we're sure you will agree, the fruit of their moist, feverish tuney brains is enough to keep you comfortably balmy. The B5 gets a twin-turbo V8 pushing out 507bhp - equal to the outgoing M5 - and 516lb ft of torque, which is good for a 4.7s 0-62mph dash and a 191mph top speed.

The B5 also gets an eight-speed auto, reconfigured adjustable electronic dampers and 20-inchers sans run-flats, which is a wise decision.

Despite this enormous power and drug-dealer-spec rims, Alpina reckons the B5 will happily return 26.5mpg. We presume this figure was calculated without taking into account something called ‘accelerator pedal'.

Sounds tempting, no? Don't forget, although BMW has yet to announce anything Official about the next M5, it will likely come with a twin-turbo V8 too, probably from the X5/X6M and probably producing upwards of 560bhp...

Which would you prefer - this B5, or an M5?

Vijay Pattni