Australian Super Stock racer Steve Norman has decided to shake things up a bit in the Australian National Drag Racing Association (ANDRA) by ditching his championship-winning Chevrolet Cobalt and switching to an American-powered German luxury car. Norman’s freshly built 2008 M3 E92 from Ryan and Reg Lee at R/T Marine isn’t what you normally see at the drag strip, but this car has the build quality to help him win another ANDRA title very soon.

Back in 2015, Norman won the ANDRA Super Stock title behind the wheel of his Don Ness-built Cobalt, but he decided it was time to build something different. Originally, Norman had his eye on building a killer Jaguar XK8 Super Stocker, but the car’s alloy body wouldn’t allow for a chrome-moly cage and chassis that would meet SFI standards. Norman spotted a BMW E92 at Perth Motorplex in the pits as a support car and that planted the seed for his next build.

“Steve thought the E92 was a great looking car so he asked the owner if we could measure the car’s wheelbase and engine bay real quick. The car would fit the class we wanted to race and the engine bay had the space for his motor so we started looking for one. The car we used was actually from the United States and it took my dad and I about 18 months to complete the car,” Lee says.

The underpinnings of the BMW consist of a 25.5C SFI chassis that was built by John Lang at JL Race Cars. All of the suspension came from Norman’s Cobalt and include a titanium differential housing, Lamb Components front struts and Lamb Components carbon brakes at each corner. A custom GMM four-link suspension helps keep the rear of the car planted to the track with a set of four-way adjustable JRI rear shocks.

To power his BMW, Norman kept his Book Racing Engines 312 cubic-inch small-block Chevy that was in his championship winning Cobalt. Airs Race Pipes crafted a set of beautiful headers for the BMW to help expel the exhaust gasses and produce a great all-motor sound. A Proflight transmission from Protrans is matched up to a billet bolt-together Coan Racing converter that uses a billet stator. An MSD box provides the spark while a RacePak v300 gathers data and presents it to Norman on the RacePak dash.

Ryan and his dad put the entire car together in their shed as a team. The paint was done by Ryan’s brother, Bryce, who put a lot of effort into the body and paint work to make the bright orange paint look perfect. Seal Fabworx helped with a lot of the fab work and welding, while Doug Elsworhty assisted with any tricky alloy work.

The plan is to keep running the car in ANDRA Super Stock, which is actually closer to NHRA Competition Eliminator. The BMW falls into the Modified Production class where it has to use the OEM engine bay, floor, and body to fit the class. Norman’s goal is to become the first MP legal car to run into the seven-second zone.

The BMW has already been to the track and according to Lee it’s already showing a ton of promise. “On the very first half-track shakedown pass, the car drove like it was on rails for Steve. The car performed better than expected and has a lot left in it after we start some suspension changes.”

Norman’s BMW is one of the more interesting class cars you will see anywhere. The sleek lines of the German luxury car work well with the brute force of the American horsepower under the hood. Look for Norman to start breaking records and picking up wins in the land down under with this killer BMW very soon.