My Bird Can Fly! (Also the new GT500)

Greetings fellow FORD performance fans

Where do I start. My routes are motorcycle street racing and drag racing, which I gave up after nearly killing my self twice. I'm 56....have seen the good old days and now enter yet another mid life crisis....what could be a "last hurrah" for dynosaur driven horsepower? My wife and I have owned had various Mustangs, notably a 1970 supercobrajet with a drag pack that I regrettably sold and still mourn till this day

What solved most of my loss of the 1970 Mustang and overall lust for speed was the move to the Thunderbird Supercoupe around 1997. I bought a 1992 supercoupe for my wife and suddenly realized supercharging was immensely seductive yet practical. Now 11 years later I have 6 of them under various stages of modification. My total investment in the cars and the mods has been about 25K. The idea behind "my bird can fly" is the fact that this T-bird is one of the most aerodynamic cars ever built, possibly the best by Ford. I've tried to reach top speed with this car on public roads, posting a best of 165mph over a 2 1/2 mile country road. I'm betting the car is capable of 175 with the right stretch of road.

What has brought me here is *pinch me* I now have a 2007 GT500 as a result of a botched deal with a Chrysler dealer to get a cash for clunker rebate and a new Caliber for my wife. Part of the day's promotion was the GT500 sitting out in front to lure people in. For about 4 hours I sat there one Saturday afternoon staring at that car and the people milling around it through the front window as if to say "just sit put....you can look but don't touch"...while the saleman worked us over (and over). Worn down and frustrated that we were going in circles on the clunker deal I talked on the cell phone to my son about the GT500....how cool the car looked in vista blue.

I kept on poking my wife to just leave and salvage what was left of a beautiful Saturday afternoon, and then fate arrived in the form of a saleman that said, hey...why don't you take it for a ride.

Me?....why me?....the keys were in the door but I was assuming a ride wasn't going to happen...at any minute they'd be driving it in for the day. 100 people had looked at it so why now? So off we went....I knew where to take her and I knew what my T-bird was capable of around the local North Jersey backroads. What immediately struck me was how refined the car was. I had heard from other Mustang owners that their cars were not built well, that they rattled, etc. This car felt rock solid. The exhaust was too well mannered. I expected nasty habits but only got drive by wire refinement. My T-bird (I thought) seems to have more punch....why isn't it going into boost??....well, except when you....ah....hold the pedal to the floor at 4000 rpm.

Hmmm. I did not coax the car into any of the much maligned traction problems that day (which of course now I must have immediate help on as the weather grows cold and the supercharger becomes more froggy). So for what I felt I could get away with with someone watching my every move seemed to be quite blissful...I was sold. I instantly leaped 20 years into future technology....I knew the torque curve was as flat as flat could be but have never experience total linearity of power with pedal depression across an RPM range. I thought to myself....I can race superbikes with this car (as I do in the T-bird).

The seat was the most comfortable I've ever driven it for my 6'1" 230lb frame, my head can rest ever so lightly on the headrest...everything seems to be right were it should be. We've test driven 20 different cars in search for my wife's new car across the gammit of BMW to you name it. But I was impressed and entertained. I remember reading somewhere that Shelby commented, "I wouldn't change anything about the car"...and I thought well, perhaps that traction control.....well anyway the car presses buttons and it entertains. Sterile feedback and perfect parameters of performance don't yield a car that is ultimately fun to drive. Forgive me but I love the vette bashing amongst the GT500 forums because I've riden in Vettes and I have no sense of entertainment....no real shit eaten grin occurs.

BMWs....well my wife has one, they are great for women. Their engines "sing"??? I prefer the note of this supercharger at 4000 rpm.

Of course having had the 1970 supercobrajet with shaker hood I knew a different sense of erotic charm that only throwing buckets of gas into a carburetor can manufacture. But I thought to myself....can this car really get 20 mpg? Is that possible? As bad as many writeups have been on this type of gas mileage I counter with....holy geeze...18?... that is quite astounding. I get as low as 12 mpg in my supercharged T-bird that is perhaps only 325hp. I can get about 21 if I baby it. With the GT500 I've been getting between 16 and 18, driving very hard about 20% of the time. So I'll live with the drive by wire and take the 17 mpg. A better sounding exhaust will probably make me forget about all that.

It took me about 1 month to get over the guilt and now I'm settled in as glad to own what represents one of the best, most practical, most usable versions of American muscle. This is a car that begs to be driven past. It also honkers down and becomes quite stable at something around 140mph.

But I'm not telling you anything you don't already know.