THSCC Forums

My cousin has an 1988 m5 E28 he wants to auto-x but is worried he will be out classed. His tech is as follows:stock with strut bar, ECU chip, short shifter. Sounds like STX, but the M5 is excluded. Would he have to run in SM, is there a SP class the M5 fits in?

I think it falls into E-Street Prepared by the catch all phrase there of: "Other sedans over 3.0L not otherwise classified". Hence he could run in TIR class under ESP class or run in ESP outright.

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Current stable:
2019 BMW M2 Competition slicktop 6MT
2011 BMW M3 sedan slicktop 6MT
2007 BMW 328i wagon (slushbox for now)
1975 CanAm 125MX2

He will be outclassed...but it will have absolutely nothing to do with the car. If he's truly a novice, there's a fairly good chance that an H-Stock MINI will run a better raw time than he will. It's irrelevant. Tell him not to worry about it and come out and have fun.

As for the class, I think Chuck is probably right. ESP sounds reasonable.

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Tom Freeman
'98 M3/4/5 | '93 Spec3 325i | '12 TSX sport wagon | '03 Tahoe
Team Silver Bullets '91 240SX

Tom's right I believe, ESP sounds right.

Tell him that this happens a lot - a LOT. People get introduced to competitive driving *after* they've modified the car, and as a result, they get put into some unfortunate classes. If memory serves, the ST* classes were designed, to some degree, to eliminate this problem.

No idea why the M5 would be excluded though - I can't imagine it being much faster than, say, an STU M3.

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Karl S.
2014 Baby, 2014 House, 2013 Ford Focus ST, 2013 BMW 328i, 1994 Mercedes E320
(Insert passive aggressive signature line here)

The E28 M5 might be legal in STU (granted I don't know much about ST* classes). Under the STU class list, it only exempts the E39 and E60 M5. Hence it would seem the car could run in STU...assuming they allow ECU mods in STU that is, but the point should be to come out, have fun and most importantly focus on learning how to drive better. Forget about the times and focus on the process of learning.

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Current stable:
2019 BMW M2 Competition slicktop 6MT
2011 BMW M3 sedan slicktop 6MT
2007 BMW 328i wagon (slushbox for now)
1975 CanAm 125MX2

The E28 M5 is STU legal. It is only excluded from STX. So STU would be perfectly fine to run as well.

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2010 Honda Fit Sport
Couple of bicycles