Hi Folks!
First time posting on NAM. Been a BMW fan for about 12 years now (1998 BMW 328i, 2008 BMW M5), but with the ridiculous gas prices I found myself needing to find an alternative.

It started with "Yeah, OK. MINI is a cool car. I see many of them in my parking lot at work. BMW owns MINI and the fun/quality/safety factors have to be built in. Gas mileage has got to be better than 9 mpg (Having fun in the M5 with 500 HP can really hurt the pocket book!). Let's see how much a stock MINI would cost..."

The "FROM" Price reeled me in. 12 weeks of anxious waiting and a lot more $$ than I thought I was going to spend....I got my "MINI M5"!

So before anyone out there says, "Hey, you bought the M5 knowing completely that it LOVES gas and if you could afford one you shouldn't be *$&% about the $$...", I'll confess:

The M5 is a way cool car; HOWEVER, what I realized I was REALLY aching for was a quick, zippy car that had a high coolness factor and felt like a go-kart, well at least like something that felt like the Datsun 510 when I was a kid.

12 weeks in the waiting and what I ended up with was a 2009 Laser Blue MCS with the JCW aero kit. Oh, and last week I placed the order for the JCW tuning kit for automatics -- YES. It's finally out!

So "Hello" to my new MINI friends. I've been on the "E60.net" (BMW 5-Series) forum for a number of years, under the same username. I look forward to chatting with the MINI family!

Cheers to all!
-CoolTones

 

Welcome to MINIs!!!!!

 

Welcome! And that's one nice looking R56.

mb

 

Very nice! That was the other color I was debating. I really like it!

 

Hmmm, store front looks familiar. Mini of Mt View?! If so, make sure to take your new MCs up to Mt Hamilton just to break it in with some nice twisties.

 

Welcome and congrats! Your story sounds familiar as I'm in the process of unloading my E39 M5 to make room for my '09 JCW that should be here in about 3 weeks. I was thinking the same thing as you and then I made the mistake of actually taking out a Mini for a test drive.....

Enjoy!!!!

 

Welcome! What a beautiful car.

 

She is a real beauty! Does she (or he) have a name, yet?

 

Welcome Cooltones. I went through similar reasoning with my 03 911 as my daily driver. After 87,000 miles of daily drives & my commute taking me more & more on the city streets, I also wanted something that was more efficient, but without taking too much hit on the drivability/fun factor. I ended up ordering a MCS & found NAM. I don't think there is any other viable choice. I am going to Motor, Motor, and Motor on !! I am also a bimmer fan and still have 05 X5 4.4 and 06 750 Li. My first BMW was 1972 R100 bike that I bought in college for $1500, spent whole summer to fix, and 01 330 coupe was my first auto.

 

Thanks for the kind replies, Folks!
Laser Blue caught my eye. All of my past cars have either been Arctic Silver, Titanium Silver, or Silverstone. Enough silver already. Saw the Laser Blue color and KNEW that was the color I wanted!
Sure is tough to keep it under 4500 RPM for the first 1,200 miles! Already took it up skyline on Hwy 9. Somehow it *felt* like I was quicker in my MCS than my M5! I'm going to have to set the timer on both cars and see which one was actually quicker.
Name for the car? Seems that my 4-year old has picked out a name: We took her to see "Bolt" last night. When we got home, she called my MCS, "Blue Bolt"! Guess that's his name!
Thanks for sharing your "How I ended up with my MINI" stories. Makes me feel much better!
Cheers,
-CoolTones