Brown Lee, a Ford dealer in Morrison, Tennessee, created a limited-edition Mustang GT that honors the illustrious performance of the Blue Oval and at the same time promises to give the 760 horsepower Shelby GT500 its money. The dealer's Gulf Heritage Mustang offers a long list of performance-oriented mechanical and visual add-ons for enthusiasts who want to pay supercar money for it.
The Gulf Heritage Mustang starts its life as an advanced GT. It gets a light blue and orange wave paint that pays homage to the GT40 that won the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1968 and 1969. It's not the first time we've seen this livery on a 21st-century Ford; the modern GT comes with the same paintwork as buyers choose the Heritage Edition package. 20-inch light-alloy wheels finished in a glossy gray shade and a carbon-fiber body kit complete the look.
The space between the striking blue fenders of the Mustang is occupied by a 5.0-liter V8 engine with a supercharged up to 800 hp and a torque of 674 pounds-feet. It sprints from a little to 60 mph in just under 3.5 seconds, a figure that makes it about half a second faster than the Mustang GT on which it is based. Buyers can choose whether the cavalry reaches the rear wheels via an automatic 10-speed transmission or a 6-speed manual gearbox. Neither is available on the GT500, so we wonder if they need to be strengthened to cope with the extra power.
Brown Lee has upgraded the V8 with a 3.0-liter supercharger, an air-to-water intercooler, a high-flow air induction system and meatier injectors. Suspension suspension that makes the Mustang lower and firmer helps enthusiasts to take advantage of the 340 hp bump compared to a standard GT. To add context, it is the same as injecting the power of a 2020 Toyota Supra into the Mustang powertrain.
The finishing touch is a metal plate engraved on the engine compartment with the car's serial number; Brown Lee makes 119 examples of the Gulf Heritage Mustang. It is available as a coupe and as a convertible, and prices start at $ 140,000. That figure places it in the same margin as other high-powerpower machines such as the Nissan GT-R, Acura NSX, Jaguar F-Type and chic variants of the Porsche 911. A Mustang for 911 money kicks is ambitious, but tuners such as Shelby and Roush – with which Brown Lee often cooperates – has shown that the market is there.