There are certain cars that never really leave the Nürburgring. Even when they disappear from the entry list, they remain in the memories of those who watched them thunder down Döttinger Höhe at full song.

The BMW Z4 GT3 is one of those cars.

With its long bonnet, compact cabin and unmistakable naturally aspirated V8, it defined an era of early GT3 racing. When its homologation expired at the end of 2019, the Z4 quietly vanished from the Nordschleife. BMW had already moved on to the M4 as its flagship GT programme, and although Peter Posavac continued to run a privately entered Z4 until that point, the car disappeared from the grid once its homologation ended. The chapter appeared closed.

In 2026, that chapter reopens.

GT REPORT spoke with Julian Reeh about bringing the BMW Z4 GT3 back to the ADAC Ravenol 24 Hours of the Nürburgring with his Saugmotoren Motorsport team. What began in a private garage has quickly grown into one of the most talked-about entries on this year’s grid.

From tourist laps to a 24-hour dream

For Reeh, racing did not begin with a grand plan. It began, as it does for many, with curiosity.

“You go to the Nordschleife for the first time, you do some laps during tourist drives, then you book your first track day,” he recalls. “You do this for a couple of years, you learn the track, and after some time you decide to drive your first race.”

That first race was in RCN. Three years later, he was celebrating the 2024 RCN championship. Reeh’s passion for racing became a shared project. Friends and family joined in, helping where they could. The group eventually took on a name: Saugmotoren Motorsport.

“It’s a hobby,” Reeh emphasises. “There’s no main business behind it and the main goal is to have fun and a great time. We do everything in the evenings after our main jobs are done.”

The next step after RCN was NLS and, ultimately, the Nürburgring 24 Hours in 2025 with a Porsche 997 GT3 Cup. The result was victory in SP7. A strong enough result to make repeating it feel unnecessary.

“With how last year ended in such a positive way, we said – or rather, I said – there is no way to top this result with the 997. If we race the 24 Hours again, we need to do it with another car.”

The car that waited

That other car had been sitting in his garage since the end of 2021.

Reeh had purchased a BMW Z4 GT3 largely out of admiration. Yet it rarely ran.

“I drove it maybe three or four days in total. Some track days, a shootout. Most of the time it was just parked because we were busy with the 997 and I don’t have the time to run two or three cars at the same time because there’s also the main job.”

This particular Z4 carries its own piece of Nordschleife history. It is the 2015 chassis run by Walkenhorst Motorsport, the same car that scored a VLN victory that season.

“It is the very same car,” Reeh confirms, adding it will run in its original JP Performance and Dunlop art livery.

For him, the appeal is emotional as much as competitive.

“When it was launched in 2010, I watched it as a spectator. For me, it was always the most fascinating GT3 car ever made, and it still is. Maybe someone prefers Mercedes or Porsche. I’m not totally a BMW guy, but I kind of prefer BMW in motorsport. The Z4 is just the most interesting one I could imagine driving.”

A message, then a plan

When the idea of entering the Z4 in the 24 Hours took shape, Reeh reached out to Henry Walkenhorst.

“I sent him a WhatsApp. Thirty seconds later he called me. The first sentence he said was, ‘I will be one of the drivers.’”

That brief exchange quickly turned into a concrete plan. Reeh will share the Z4 with Walkenhorst, reconnecting the 2015 chassis with one of the names most closely linked to its competitive past.

But while the car may carry factory-era pedigree, the team around it remains unmistakably grassroots.

“Our team is around 20 to 25 people,” Reeh explains. “Mostly family and friends. Almost no professional engineers or mechanics. I really think we are the only team in SP9 that is purely a hobby team.”

What Saugmotoren lacks in corporate structure, it makes up for in experience behind the wheel.

Alongside Reeh and Walkenhorst is Ralf Schall. With more than 100 NLS victories – and still counting – to his name, Schall has raced an extraordinary range of machinery at the circuit, from the Mercedes-Benz 190 Evo II to the Opel Astra V8 Coupé DTM. He was also part of the Saugmotoren Porsche line-up last year, making this a continuation of an already successful partnership.

Completing the quartet is Christian Scherer. Known to many Nürburgring regulars for his countless Touristenfahrten laps and popular social media presence, Scherer will make his GT3 debut in the Z4. While the machinery is new territory, the circuit itself is anything but.

Keeping it authentic

Although alternative classes were possible, Reeh chose to enter the car in SP9 (GT3) to preserve its original character.

“If we run SP9, we can more or less bring the car as it is. If you go to SP8, you would have to change the rear wing, reduce horsepower, add weight. I don’t want to change too much.”

Because this chassis had already competed at the Nürburgring 24 Hours up until 2019, many updates had been completed previously.

Keeping a homologation-expired GT3 alive requires foresight. When BMW announced last September that it would end Z4 GT3 spare parts support — initially even signalling that remaining stock would be cleared out — Reeh acted quickly.

“I bought a big spare parts package with parts I thought would be sensible for the future. Later BMW decided to continue some support, but they don’t have everything. For example, they don’t have any engine parts at all.”

Currently, the car sits stripped down at Walkenhorst Motorsport for its pre-race rebuild — the very team that once ran this chassis in period. Drawing on their experience with the Z4 platform, the initial preparation is being carried out at their workshop before the car returns to the Saugmotoren crew for trackside duties.

“And then we made our heads and thought, how can we do it in the most efficient way?” Reeh explains. “Henry said that with all the experience his team had with the Z4 as a previous owner over the last years, the best and most sensible thing is that they will do the technical preparation of the car before the race. And on track, on site, my team and myself will take care of everything that has to be done there.”

The work is extensive.

“It is mostly stripped down. We have to renew the fuel tank. I bought a second new engine last week. There will be a new gearbox. You know how the preparation of such cars is. Mostly everything will be new.”

The plan is to debut the car at the 24h Qualifiers weekend before lining up for the main event.

Seeing the finish line

Despite the nostalgia and excitement, Reeh remains pragmatic.

“The financial aspect and the time you put into a 24-hour race, especially as a hobby team, is crazy. The worst thing would be crashing in the first hour and not being able to get it back on track. That would be a nightmare.”

Therefore, pure pace is not the priority.

“I don’t care if the car is five or ten seconds per lap faster or slower. For me, it’s about participating and trying to see the finish line.

“Maybe there’s like a little chance because we’re running in SP9’s Am class for amateurs. Theoretically, we would have a chance to win this, but it’s not the main goal.”

The fan reaction has already provided validation.

“It’s crazy. I could not imagine more engagement. One friend told me after the announcement that with this big fan engagement, we already won. Now it’s just about driving and seeing the finish line.”

Six years after its homologation expired, the BMW Z4 GT3 returns to the Nürburgring 24 Hours. Not because it had to, but because someone believed it should. And at the Nordschleife, belief can sometimes carry just as much weight as factory backing.

Want more Z4 history?

Continue your trip down memory lane with our interview with ‘Zetti’ racer Peter Posavac, who once called the BMW Z4 GT3 “the real heart of motorsport”.

Revisit our conversation with Bas Leinders on racing the BMW Z4 GTE in its final season — the factory-backed evolution of BMW’s V8 era.

And relive the final hours of the Z4’s homologation with our BMW Z4 GT3 gallery, published on New Year’s Eve 2019 as the car’s FIA approval officially came to an end.