Thursday, April 18, 2024

Let Those 500 Horses Run

March 15, 2012


My old Team Dodge racing suit

Today was just another unusually warm day this season here in the Northeastern United States. I don't get many days to do nothing. For a couple hours, I pretended as if I didn't have a care in the world.

I called upon my old race-driving skills and hit the open road in what I affectionately call my Orange Beast. It's a one-of-a-kind factory made custom Ford Mustang Shelby Cobra GT500 Convertible in Grabber Orange w/out stripes and details.

Ford asked me when I ordered it, "Why would you want a Shelby GT500 that doesn't look like one? I replied, "When I pull up next to people I want them to wonder what kind of car it is?"

Years ago, I went to the Skip Barber Racing School and I've learned to do a lot of things with a car. Every now and then, if I see an empty parking lot (after hours) I'll do a few one-eighties or what we used to call handbrake-turns: where you spin the car around and head either backwards in the same direction (my personal favorite) or as the car is slowing, hit the accelerator and head back in the direction you were just coming from.

However, today, I just got on the highway, blasted the Orange Beast's stereo and Let Those 500 Horses Run.

 


A normal looking GT500


Lime Rock Park in upstate Ct. I've driven it so many times I have every inch of it memorized


Cars lined up in race formation at Skip Barber's


A tricked-out Grabber Orange & Black Mustang


Waiting for the garage door to open so the Orange Beast can Let Those 500 Horses Run