In the quest for EV world domination, BMW once tried to mimic Tesla's dedicated EV platform strategy without infringing on its 'copyright.' Unfortunately, that didn't pan out too well.
Tesla, a company that didn't exist a little over two decades ago, has had the same strategy from the beginning – dedicated EV platforms that are as streamlined as possible in a bid to lower costs and increase efficiency. With that, they built a powerhouse – the world's largest EV maker and one of the most valuable companies on the planet.
Not long ago, BMW decided they could do the same – only better. As such, they embarked on a marvelous project that saw the apparition of the i3 EV city car and the i8 plug-in hybrid sports car. They were a bit out of this world with their particular bill of materials but ultimately failed to gain traction – most likely because they tried to innovate too much.
Nowadays, both are nowhere to be seen, but BMW thrives with almost identical EVs as their ICE-powered counterparts. In America, for example, the EV lineup is comprised of the i4 (essentially a 4 Series Gran Coupe with zero emissions), the first-ever i5, the quirky iX, and the i7. Of all three – and many others, only the iX is not directly related to a traditional ICE-powered model.
That's an entirely different mentality compared to the original days of the BMW i sub-brand and also from what Tesla uses even today. As such, it would be interesting to see who gets to win a brawl, right? No worries; even the local quarter-mile dragstrip will give us plenty of opportunities. For example, the videographer behind the Wheels Plus channel on YouTube is a big fan of Bandimere Speedway and Mission Raceway Park but also loves The Strip.
Located at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the four-lane facility welcomes everyone – even a couple of eerily silent foes. More precisely, BMW and Tesla exemplify their clash in EV philosophy with a base application – a race between the entry-level Tesla Model 3 and the BMW i4. Unfortunately, there are no details about the vehicle, so there's no way of telling if they were of the Performance or M50 kind – but that's maybe less important than the battle's outcome.
As it turns out, BMW wasn't wrong about moving back to a more judicious ICE and EV arrangement for its current i models because it seems that performance is not an issue. As such, with both drivers nailing a good start, in the end the BMW took home the laurels with an ET of 11.59s versus Tesla's 11.68s pass. Based on these numbers, it's safe to assume that, indeed, these were a Tesla Model 3 Performance and a BMW i4 M50, not the base RWD and eDrive35 (or eDrive40).
Secondly, if you want to see something cool and quite rare, the second skirmish is between a Tesla and a Jaguar F-Type! Now, guess who won that one…
Aurel has aimed high all his life (literally, at 16 he was flying gliders all by himself) so in 2006 he switched careers and got hired as a writer at his favorite magazine. Since then, his work has been published both by print and online outlets, most recently right here, on autoevolution. Full profile
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