Hot Wheels crowns a life-size toy at the NEC
Full disclosure: Petrolblog’s mate runs the PR agency behind this very story. But even if he didn’t, we’d still be writing about it, because… well, flame-spitting Rover V8 in a BMW 3-Series. What’s not to love?
The UK leg of the 2025 Hot Wheels Legends Tour has been won by a full-fat, 900kg E21 built by Paul and Ethan Foster over the course of 14 years in Wickford, Essex. Not the sort of 3 Series you’d find with flaking arches and questionable coilovers at your local Tesco car park, but a track weapon with proper Group 2 touring car swagger dialled up until Mattel would happily shrink-wrap it in blister packaging.
The father-and-son project is pure Hot Wheels fantasy made metal: wide arches, tyres the size of living room furniture, a carbon-topped Group 5 wing and side pipes that spit actual flames. Under the bonnet? A 420bhp Rover 5.0-litre V8 with twin Jenvey throttle bodies. It’s basically what you’d come up with if you were let loose in the shed with crayons, glassfibre and a stash of old Top Trumps cards.
“It’s part of our family and we’ll never sell it,” said Paul after bagging the trophy at SlammedUK’s Gravity Show, held at an exhibition centre four miles north of Catherine-de-Barnes, just off the M42.
The judging panel – which included Hot Wheels designer Charlie Angulo, Red Bull podcast host Nicola Hume, Slammed UK’s Jordan Clarke and influencer-turned-car-builder Mat Armstrong – whittled down more than 200 contenders to a final seven. The panel didn't include a representative for the nations parents, who have grown accustomed to being pestered for a Hot Wheels whenever they do their weekly grocery shopping.
Everything from historic racers to off-roaders was in the mix, but it was the Essex BMW (and a Jaguar Mark VII, of all things) that went straight through to the final cut.
Victory means the Fosters’ E21 now heads to the European final, with a shot at joining the Hot Wheels Garage of Legends and, crucially, a chance to be immortalised as a 1:64 die-cast car. So in 2026 some unsuspecting kid might well be pestering their mum in Smyths for a flame-spitting Rover-powered BMW 3 Series.
Petrolblog thoroughly approves, although naturally, it would prefer to see a totally standard E21 in a blister pack. A 323, of course.
Of course, buying a Hot Wheels and not posting it on social media is still considered the ultimate fail – as Petrolblog once discovered here.
