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Mustang mach 111/19/2023 ![]() ![]() It was a good choice of badge name: The original car broke 295 speed and endurance records during its debut year. ![]() Ford chose it in celebration of the man who achieved that first, a total god of speed, legendary American fighter pilot Chuck ‘Right Stuff’ Yeager. Mach 1 is basically the speed above the point where the sound barrier is breached. He gave a bit of an insight to the model’s history then, so no need to repeat all that, though perhaps one fresh factoid unearthed since is surely fascinating enough to share. First meeting of the car came with Americarna, Taranaki’s annual celebration in February of anything to do with US motoring, when Rob Maetzig used NMR275 to shadow the participant pack, managing to track down an original 1969 Mach 1 while doing do. You’ll be aware this was MotoringNZ’s second Mach 1 run. Forty-nine of each straight to the public, one retained by the brand to play with for a while, then sell off. Everyone’s happy, right?Īssuredly, Ford will keep pumping out specials of old and new, too and, just assuredly, Ford NZ will keep the allocation slim – 50 of these, just as there were 50 Bullitts. So, some can play ohm on the range, some can stick – for as long as they can stand the price of fuel and, perhaps, some degree of public shaming – their old gas guzzlers. Odds are good that the next car will be gunning for business purely as a V8 car. The sixth generation S550 shape the Mach 1 derives from dates back to 2014, but is the basis of a gen seven, coming here in 2024 and, from all reports, also set for a long production life. Maybe there’ll even be a Model T sometime in the future.Īnyway, this transition into the battery age isn’t quite the shock moment in Mustang history some make it out to be, as even when the ‘new’ establishes, the ‘old’ is set to live on. The second electric is called Explorer, the third seems set to be Capri. And Ford clearly sees merit in revitalising famous old names. Using the name of an icon in association with that exercise at least gets tongues wagging. Building a new car that customers will actually pay attention to, let alone lay down their money one, is no easy task. And it’s a car I’m truly looking forward to.Īt risk of riling up old-school fans, that a battery-wedded sports utility takes the same name as the famous coupe (and coneretible) doesn’t upset me. Mustang Mach 1 was great but Mach-E is the future. The launch will go on … elsewhere, and it promises to be an important one. Like I say, a LOT of thought had gone into this. Yes, the place named after the guy who co-drive, with Bruce McLaren, the GT40 that claimed Ford’s most famous single motor-racing win ever, Le Mans, 1966. Had it found sign-off, the guests would have exposed the new electric to great terrain and country roads but would have wrapped up with a drive-off between the old top gun I was driving and the most powerful of the electrics – the twin motor GT – on Manfeild’s Circuit Chris Amon. An event that, had it played out, would have actively incorporated the Mustang Mach 1 I’d been provisioned to drive on a full recce of the route I’d sorted in the Manawatu. I was really looking forward to writing how I’d put up a voluntary hand to help sort the upcoming first national media involvement Mustang Mach-E. So, it was that all the poring over maps, helping with meet-and-greets and dropping into venues, all to help out a mate in a bit of bind about where to locate a national event he wants to be something a bit special, were wasted. But the overnight accommodation? A big fail. The racing circuit, the lunchtime arrangements, the restaurant for the celebratory dinner, the flights schedules? All got big ticks, too. Everyone was hand-picked with care and consideration for the job in hand. The roads? They easily passed muster, as I knew they would. ![]() Blame, of all things, the poor quality – a highly ironic word for those who know my local area – of the only hotels in my home town available to accommodate a big group of media and brand hosts on the dates they needed. Not so much: Tired interior, limited visibility.ĬONCEIVABLY it could have been a story spun as a baton change between generations.Ī day or two spending quality time at the wheel of the greatest of the current old guard cars the factory provisions to chart a path for an eerily similarly-named successor that really is something new. We like: Engineering quality, level of driver involvement. Vital statistics: 4784mm long, 2080mm wide, 1381mm high, wheelbase 2720mm. Powertrain: 5.0-litre normally-aspirated V8, 345kW/ 556Nm, six-speed manual, rear wheel drive, claimed economy 13.9 L/100km, 320 g/100 CO2.
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