Re: My First Reaction to a Shelby (LONGISH)

In a message dated 2/11/05 22:15:05, musclecars001@yahoo.com writes:

<< What a great topic, Pete! With apologies to Mike
Drew, the avowed king of captivating true
storytelling, I will attempt to entertain you with a
true story about my "first time." >>

>>>HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!

Thanks for the compliment! :>)

I sort of backed into the Shelby Mustang thing by very indirect means. I
suppose many of you realize that my first and deepest love is for the De Tomaso
Pantera.

My father was 50 years older than me, and a car nut, but because he grew up
in the depression, his interests were totally focused on the dream cars of the
30's. Duesenbergs, Rolls-Royce, Packards, Cadilliacs, and the more cylinders
the better. I remember being taken to the Hillsborough Concours (still a very
high-end affair in the hoity-toity town south of San Francisco) when I was
about four or five years old, and being captivated by the fact that a Duesenberg
could glide past and be TOTALLY SILENT yet the car had a supercharger and
could go more than 100 mph.

I was one of those kids who was trained to recognize and verbally identify
every single car on the road. From Audi to Chrysler to VW, my father would
point and ask and I'd proudly announce what it was; if I didn't know he'd teach me.

Although he had no interest in modern or performance cars, I did. Perhaps
stemming from my early love of Hot Wheels, I grew to believe that any car that
had wide tires and mag wheels was a Racing Car. I also had no clue about
automotive mechanics, but believed that a car was propelled down the road not by
means of a spinning driveshaft, but rather by the exhaust, much like a jet.
Finally, I logically concluded that the limiting factor governing a car's speed
was the numbers on the speedometer. If the speedo went to 120, then the car
went to 120. Simple.

So imagine my shock when, at the tender age of 5, I was in the back of our
three-story house in San Francisco and I heard a RACING CAR out front! I ran to
the front of the house, and the windows were shaking. There, down below,
across the street, was a white missile.

I raced down the two flights of stairs and out the door, utterly captivated
by this car which was so low that I could almost see across the roof! The
shape was sensational, unlike anything I'd ever seen. The driver had gone inside
the house across the street. As I walked around the back--

MY GOD! It has FOUR exhaust pipes!!!!! Can you imagine how much faster that
makes this car?

Then I peered into the window and almost died on the spot--the speedometer
went to 200 MILES PER HOUR!!!!!

I was almost peeing my pants with excitement. Then the driver came out, with
a little kid in tow--apparently the neighbor had been babysitting. I was
green with envy as the kid got into the passenger seat. The driver folded
himself into the car, turned the key and VAROOM!!!!!! The noise coming from what
undoubtedly were (and still are) the smallest mufflers ever fitted to a modern
production car was unbelievable. I could feel the vibrations pounding my chest.

He slotted it into first gear, eased away from the curb and then nailed it
and banged second, chirping the tires, then disappeared from view as the road
went down a steep hill.

I was stunned. It was as if a UFO had landed on my street. I didn't know
anything about that car, but I could read even then, and knew that it was a
DeTomaso Pantera. That's a name I would never forget.

Fast-forward to 1977. We were living in the doldrums of the automotive age.
Simply put, cars sucked, and sucked big-time. The Gremlin, Hornet, Maverick,
and Mustang II were the 'aspirational' cars of the late 70's, along with
bloated and underpowered Corvettes. Meanwhile, Honda had released the 750-Four
and in 1973, Kawasaki came back with their Z-1 900. My neighbor up the street
had a first-year Z-1 with a Kerker exhaust, and that, to me, was what
PERFORMANCE was all about. To this day I have an undying love for air-cooled Kawasaki
superbikes (which is why I have three of them in the garage--alas, all of them
are dead, waiting for time and money to return to their former glory).

Then, in 1977 I went to the movies with a friend on a Saturday. In those
days before the internet, we would just go to the theater and then decide what to
see when we got there. That day, there was a poster for a movie called "The
Gumball Rally". Hey, it has a bunch of Hot Wheels-looking cars in it, let's
check that out.

I was again totally flattened by the experience. I had never heard of the
427 Shelby Cobra, and although I knew generally what a Ferrari was, I'd never
heard of a Daytona, much less a spyder. I was captivated by the movie (actually
I really liked the yellow Camaro too, and briefly had a fetish for them), and
when it let out, I went to the pay phone and called home and told my mom not
to expect me any time soon. I then went back into the theater and watched it
two more times!

Fast-forward again to high school. When everybody else in the world was
itching to get their driver's license, I couldn't have cared less. I wanted a
Kawasaki in the worst way and my parents wouldn't hear of it. I'm a stubborn
bastard, so in turn I announced my utter refusal to drive an automobile of any
kind. An easy enough decision to make when you consider what was on the market
in the late 70's and early 80's, and the fact that San Francisco's
mass-transit system enabled me to get around on my own most of the time--and I had
friends with cars for those other occasions.

I found out from a friend that my parents were secretly test-driving used
cars, looking to surprise me on my graduation from high school. Among the
contenders were a Pinto and some equally horrid things. I made it completely clear
that I would never lower myself so, and in fact insisted that my parents
instead use the money they had saved up and treat themselves to a vacation in
Europe (without me), and I'd instead use a portion of that money to buy myself
ammunition reloading equipment, so that I could handload my own rifle and pistol
ammo (having recently purchased my first gun, an old WWII M-1 Carbine).

My shooting buddy from high school had a massive '68 Country Squire wagon
with a 390, and we cruised around in that thing. It was he who had the Shelby
Mustang passion. I'd never heard of them when I was in high school, but his
father had been a Ford mechanic and had raised him right. Jim had all sorts of
books on Shelbys, and initially I borrowed them to read about the 427 Cobra.
But it was impossible to avoid being attracted to the Mustangs as well.

Finally, in 1988, during my senior year of college, I had joined the Pantera
Owners Club of America, and I learned that there would be a Pantera presence
at the upcoming SAAC convention to be held at nearby Sears Point. Jim and I
went up there together, and we were blown away. (By this time my parents had
relented on the whole motorcycle thing, and Jim and I rode our bikes up there).

There, for the first time, I saw real Cobras, and real Shelbys, and a
half-dozen Panteras. I was in heaven, not really knowing which way to turn. I got
my first-ever ride in a Pantera, not on the road, but instead on the racetrack.
I was walking around with my helmet in my hand, asking questions to the
owners, and one offered to take me for a ride.

Wow. What an introduction! I noted he reached 115 mph on the fastest
straight, and the cornering power (even with standard Pirelli P-7 street tires) was
astounding.

That's it--I was hooked. I had to have one. And so a few months later, I
bought one--the only one I could afford, a rusted out piece of crap that I'm
still trying to finish restoring, some 16 years later!

But that SAAC event broadened my horizons, and for the first time I began
thinking of having a collection of neat cars rather than just a single one. And
so, in 1994 I purchased my GT-350 clone, and have had a blast with it ever
since (as you well know!)

I'd never forgotten my love for the 427 Cobra, as inspired by The Gumball
Rally, and after I was almost killed in an airplane the following year, after we
landed, I had Big Thoughts. What the hell was I waiting for? I was based in
South Korea at the time, but a car that perfectly fulfilled my fantasy came up
for sale, and only an hour south of my home in San Francisco. So I flew home
(my understanding boss allowed me emergency leave, with the emergency being
that I needed to buy another car!) and soon a Contemporary 427 Cobra (with
proper side-oiler, of course) was mine!

I'm content for now, although I have always had an eye for an ERA GT40
replica. Those are way out of my league financially, although I did take a run at
one car a few years ago. Being basically unemployed right now has pushed that
dream further off into the distance, but it's far from gone.

And then just yesterday I learned that Superformance is finally taking orders
on their new GT40 replica! Deliveries are expected this May, and the price
for a painted roller will be about $40,000 less than for an ERA
build-it-yourself kit!!!

Hmm, let's see--if I get my job back in 2006 or 2007, then after about a year
I can probably afford to build a killer motor, and by then Superformance will
be making them with the Mk 1 body style (which I prefer).....

Watch this space! :>)

Mike