*disclaimer-I wrote this for my audience at Ford GT Forum. Alot of this stuff about similarity to GT will be useless if you haven't driven one, so just know I really really like my GT and driving it.*
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And a little trailer I threw together:Now that I've had some time to spend with the 2013 GT500, here's some of thoughts I have on it.
If you like your Ford GT, chances are you're going to like this car. Obviously these are two very different cars, but there's alot of things I find common between them when driving. I made the comment to Jamal and John Pfeiffer (who some of you will remember from the FGT program) that if you closed your eyes (which would be a very bad idea) you could mistake which car you're in. They both seemed to have the same assessment. It's the combination of the gearing, the power, and the power delivery that really makes the two feel similar. I never thought the Ford GT felt fast in that sort of frenetic way a European V8 does. It just sort of washes over you with this surge of power that makes you look down and suddenly realize "$#*&, I'm going really fast." This car is the same way. For me, I prefer that long rush of power to the constant shifting of a car with 3.73s. I will say that once it gets up near 7k, you can tell that it gets a little more raucous and has a sort of hybrid character of the old 5.4L and some of the new Boss 5.0.
As some of you may know, I like driving fast. This car does well at speed. It's a big heavy car, and now it's got some downforce. This makes it feel very stable and planted as you barrel towards the horizon. Above 150, the adjustable bilsteins automatically go into Sport mode. Obviously you hear the concern that "Yeah, that's a Mustang, I don't want to go 200 in that." There's no evidence of anything but this car being really good at going fast. You'll see at Nola if you come to Ford GT Rally 7.
Speaking of Sport mode, the car has some cool tech, being able to switch the shock mode on the fly, as well as the steering. There are settings for comfort, normal and sport. I think most people that live anywhere with serviceable roads will just leave it in Sport all the time.
The Recaro seats are excellent. Comfortable for driving fairly hard and comfortable for daily driving. Like the alcantara inserts. Would and did skip the color contrast striping.
The steering wheel is also excellent. Steering wheel is one of those things that can make or break a car for me. This one is nice and thick, and again the alcantara inserts are great right where you probably spent most of your time holding. Unfortunately, in my experience, alcantara that comes in contact with human skin and friction wears poorly, and I don't really expect that this will do any better.
The shifter is another dialed in item. SVT clearly spent a bunch of time getting this right. Very accurate, quick, works well being slammed or just driving regular. Cool shift knob too.
Exhaust note is good. Judge for yourself in the vid.
Unfortunately, most of the roads in Detroit only have turns at intersections, so I don't have much to say about the turning yet. I will say that the car attacks our cloverleaf entrance ramps like an animal, and the G2s are a very grippy tire vs. an FGT Eagle F1. I'm going to head down to the track at Nola in a couple weeks and will have more to say then.
Launch control is another neat function. It's in the vid too. Dial up, smoothly release the clutch and keep it pinned. It's honestly pretty surprising that the car will scoot off the line with a reasonable mix of wheelspin and stick. I think it will be alot of fun for people that like to go to the drag strip. You're going to have to play around with it a lot to dial in the right RPM for the right conditions. It will bog pretty easily with the wrong rpm. I think the track apps are fun, but gimmicky. They aren't accurate vs a vBox, and they come off slow.
Speaking of speed...I honestly couldn't tell you what's faster between this and a stock GT. They are pretty similar. I'd say that the GT is easily faster to 60. From 60-130 I'm not sure. I haven't really spent that much time driving stock GTs, but a pulley/tune GT is much faster. I did take the GT out for a minute and was reminded that however faster a 600 rwhp stock Mustang feels (and that's ludicrously fast for a stock $55k car), an 850 rwhp turbo GT lugging around 400 less pounds is reaaaaally fast.
Overally, I think everyone at SVT did a really great job with the car. It's a great send off for Carroll Shelby. It's also a great send off to this gen of Mustang and is a car I would have deemed unthinkable early in the last decade. If you're thinking about buying one, I think you'll be happy if you do. If you like the recipe of big engine, big blower, big power, big speed take advantage...
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