Rey C.
Racing is life... anything else is just waiting.
Whether you like muscle cars or not, that's some serious horsepower for $54K.
Shelby GT500 Certified At 662hp
Shelby GT500 Certified At 662hp
Get ready for ludicrous speed. The 2013 Shelby Ford Mustang GT500 has been certified at 662 horsepower – 12 more than the promised 650 – and 631 pound-feet of torque.
The mind-blowing Mustang power figures were revealed, along with EPA estimates of 16 mpg city, 24 mpg highway, in an interview earlier this week with Jamal Hameedi, chief engineer of Ford's SVT team, and Jim Owens, vice president of marketing for Shelby, at the Team Shelby forums.
Today, Ford confirmed the news and added some graphic information to the mix, as well as the claim that the 2013 GT500's V8 is the most powerful production V8 in the world. According to the dyno chart, peak power comes at just 4,000 rpm -and stays well above 500 horsepower all the way to redline. That will make for one very quick-accelerating car.
As with most extreme high-power/high-torque cars, the run to 60 mph will be done entirely in first gear, taking the time of a shift out of the mix and likely scoring the GT500 somewhere in the low-to-mid three-second range, though that has not been disclosed so far.
One slightly odd detail: due to the massive cooling and consequent air-flow requirements, the 2013 GT500 won't have a grille. There's just a big, open rectangle where it would normally be. It looks like that detail will make it through to production, though we're curious to see how Ford handles the matter.
Despite the massive power output, the 2013 GT500 will start from just $54,200, about half the price of the slightly-less-powerful (but much lighter and better-handling) Corvette ZR1. The GT500 Convertible starts at $5,000 more.