DOES AN LS-SWAPPED E30 HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO DOMINATE OUSCC?

The OPTIMA Ultimate Street Car Challenge is shaping up to be one of 2024’s most unique events, thanks to the wild diversity of the cars entered and the novel approach to crowning its winner, and the owner of the vehicle crowned the Ultimate Street Car will win a trip for two to SEMA.

The event acknowledges traditional car show disciplines like presentation and engineering, but then tests entrants in a variety of motorsport disciplines including a hot lap of Calder Park Raceway, a go-to-whoa named the ‘Speed Stop’, a drag race and a more technical motorkhana style event called the ‘Auto Test’.

Of a potential 80 entrants across five classes at the 2024 event - including former Summernats Grand Champion Livi Krevatin’s sublime Porsche 911 and Gary Reid in the VE Commodore- powered Showtime Chevy C10 - was Shayne Coote’s LS1-powered BMW E30, originally featured by Street Machine a few years back.

Scrolling through the entry list, the V8-swapped Bimmer is severely outgunned by other competitors who are bringing giant stroked and boosted bigger versions of the BMW’s venerable pushrod powerplant, however most of this huffing and puffing dyno crushers are all fitted to late model cars that we’d hazard are nearly twice the weight of the agile E30.

The LS in Shayne’s BMW is no slouch either, and at the time SM featured it, it already had the heads and cam’ swapped for aftermarket items and makes a humble 270kW at the hoops through a six speed trans, but it’s the well decorated undercarriage that’ll make this sour Kraut one to watch at OUSCC.

Coilovers front and rear along with chassis bracing, sway bars and a quick ratio steering rack are going to help the little E30 run rings around the larger cars, while sticky, track-oriented tyres and a Wilwood brake upgrade and will both put the power to the ground and reign it in respectively.

If your street car could take on Shayne’s E30, why not enter it for your chance to win a trip to SEMA? OPTIMA Ultimate Street Car Challenge entrants will also receive a free spectator entry to MotorEx the following month. Coupled with the fact that you can safely thrash your car around Calder, OUSCC is looking like good value from where we’re sitting!

Check out the website from more information about vehicle entry and spectator tickets.

Photos: Chris Thorogood