As we stared down the barrel of a twin-striped Mustang with more than 500 horsepower and the name of a Texas chicken farmer across its fanny. The last one, the 2013 Shelby GT500, had 662 horsepower, in fact, and was said to go over 200 mph. It didn’t, not for us, anyway. Even so, it was what a Shelby Mustang should be, what it has been for decades: a hot quarter-mile with a side of smoky burnout. It was a muscle car with more. Mustang lovers got sweaty, but as usual, the rest of the auto world just shrugged and moved on with evolution.
With the $49,995 GT350 and the even more track-ratty $63,495 GT350R, Ford wants to quit the pony-car sphere that the Mustang has inhabited since 1964. Supposedly using Carroll Shelby’s original race-ready Shelby GT350 as its guiding Polaris, the engineers set out to build a no-excuses track machine, more multitalented than the GT500 blunderbuss it replaces. That car was all about muscle power and 200 mph. This one is a little lighter, a lot more lithe, and perhaps able to finally get the attention of non-muscle-car types. You say you have a BMW but want something different, possibly American-made, but a Corvette isn’t your thing and a Camaro Z/28 is too brutish? Ford wants to talk to you.
The anticipated upshift was forgotten as another corner approached.
The brakes—oof, such brakes!—chomp down, but the nose doesn’t dive. The car isn’t crossed up or squirming, it’s flat and stable and ready to turn right now! Less understeer this time, a perfect arc scribed from the white line to apex to white line. And it’s on the gas again, the sound flooding back—that addictive, dazzling, erotic exhale of lyric fire.
Yes. Yes, indeed. Ford is serious.
With the $49,995 GT350 and the even more track-ratty $63,495 GT350R, Ford wants to quit the pony-car sphere that the Mustang has inhabited since 1964. Supposedly using Carroll Shelby’s original race-ready Shelby GT350 as its guiding Polaris, the engineers set out to build a no-excuses track machine, more multitalented than the GT500 blunderbuss it replaces. That car was all about muscle power and 200 mph. This one is a little lighter, a lot more lithe, and perhaps able to finally get the attention of non-muscle-car types. You say you have a BMW but want something different, possibly American-made, but a Corvette isn’t your thing and a Camaro Z/28 is too brutish? Ford wants to talk to you.
Not that the new Shelby isn’t quick, but it’s not a dedicated quarter-mile eater, either. The base GT350 reaches 60 mph in 4.3 seconds after a somewhat difficult launch and does the quarter-mile in 12.5 seconds at 117 mph. Perhaps not stunning numbers these days, but the test car did weigh 3796 pounds. With its 18-pound carbon-fiber wheels and stickier Pilot Sport Cup 2 tires, the R (at 3710 pounds) makes it to 60 in 3.9 seconds and through the quarter-mile in 12.2 seconds at 119 mph. Guess what? Porsche 911 GT3 drivers don’t jump up and down about drag-strip times. Stats that matter to them more are skidpad grip and braking distances. There, the 350 and 350R pull 0.98 g and a startling 1.10 g, while stopping from 70 mph in 152 feet and 146 feet. Ford’s priorities become clear when you check the track-sheet data.
