Ford CEO Jim Farley wasn’t joking when he said ‘game on’ back in August. That was his direct response to the Corvette team after their hybrid, 4WD, 1,233hp ZRX1 blitzed the ‘Ring in 6min and 49.3sec, eclipsing the GTD’s personal best of 6min52.1sec… Thus making the Chevy the new fastest American car ever to lap the Green Hell.
To rub salt in the wound, the ‘standard’ ZR1—with its 1,049hp, twin-turbo 5.5-liter V8 powering the rear wheels alone—wasn’t far behind, posting 6min50.7sec. But like all great, but ultimately pointless battles between two great American institutions… Ford isn’t taking this one lying down.
Or so it would appear, according to these pictures of a suspiciously angry-looking Mustang GTD taken at the Nurburgring earlier today. Clearly visible at the front are a set of downforce-boosting double dive planes. The front sills and splitter look more prominent too, while at the back it appears to be excreting its own exhausts—here’s hoping for something freer flowing and even fruitier sounding once this ugly mule becomes a tearaway ‘Stang.
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Remarkable really that Ford has found any headway to boost power and downforce when the standard cars produce 804hp and 899Nm of torque from its dry-sumped 5.2-liter supercharged V8, and 885kg of downforce at 290kph. It shouldn’t be hard to find some weight to shave, though, given it weighs a porky 1,930kg in its lightest form.
We can only assume that once the ‘Vette’s time has been beaten, a handful of these more extreme models will be offered to the paying public, in addition to the 1,000 ‘standard’ GTDs that are being built. Those cost £315,000 (around P24.46 million) in the United Kingdom (left-hand-drive only), and using Manthey’s psycho upgrade kit for the 911 GT3 RS as a guide, expect this to add another £100,000 (around P7.765 million) to the price.
Fire up the pay-per-view and watch this space; this is one heavyweight battle you don’t want to miss.
NOTE: This article first appeared on TopGear.com. Minor edits have been made.
