{"id":23436,"date":"2019-02-11T18:28:32","date_gmt":"2019-02-11T22:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/henrypayne.com\/?p=23436"},"modified":"2019-02-11T18:28:32","modified_gmt":"2019-02-11T22:28:32","slug":"from-daytona-to-evs-trusty-mustang-is-fords-performance-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/2019\/02\/from-daytona-to-evs-trusty-mustang-is-fords-performance-future","title":{"rendered":"From Daytona to EVs, trusty Mustang is Ford’s performance future"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ford<\/p>\n<\/div>

A\u00a0pony shall lead them.<\/p>\n

Ford Motor Co. may be transitioning to an SUV and\u00a0pickup brand, but the iconic Mustang muscle car is set to be the performance face of the company from its new electric crossover in 2020 to a Mustang-dominated, global\u00a0racing lineup starting this year.<\/p>\n

The Mustang will debut this weekend at Daytona 500 qualifying as Ford’s NASCAR model, replacing the\u00a0Ford Fusion sedan. With a Mustang Funny Car dragster also bowing\u00a0this weekend at the Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals outside Los Angeles, the pony car will carry the Blue Oval’s flag into battle from the Australian Super Cup Series to GT racing in Europe.<\/p>\n

“The Mustang started to go global for its vehicle sales in 2016. We wanted to mirror that with our race team,”\u00a0says\u00a0global chief of Ford Performance Motorsport\u00a0Mark Rushbrook. “As Mustang street cars have true global reach and availability, then we are switching cars to a Mustang in all of our global race series where appropriate.”<\/p>\n

The Dearborn automaker is going through wrenching global changes from abandoning its car lineup to investing in an autonomous-development-focused\u00a0Detroit train\u00a0station\u00a0to introducing\u00a040 electric vehicles by 2022.<\/p>\n

But the Mustang’s signature, shark-like face\u00a0and vertical-bar taillights will lend familiarity. The Mustang is now on sale in 146 countries and is the best-selling sports coupe in the world.<\/p>\n

The Fusion sedan will no longer be pounding around the high bankings of Daytona International Speedway this weekend.\u00a0Defending\u00a0Monster Energy\u00a0NASCAR Cup\u00a0Series\u00a0champ Joey Logano\u00a0<\/a>and his Bloomfield Hills-based Penske racing team will lead 14 Mustangs into qualifying. The 500-mile race will be held Sunday, Feb. 17, before a TV audience of over 9 million viewers.<\/p>\n

Rushbrook’s Ford Performance\u00a0team took advantage of NASCAR’s new, 2018 rules which allowed manufacturers to enter a coupe as well as the traditional sedan nameplate. Ford’s pony will join Chevrolet’s Camaro coupe \u2014\u00a0which debuted last year \u2014\u00a0and Toyota’s Camry sedan in this year’s Cup series.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

“We believe we\u2019ve designed the Mustang to be faster than the Fusion,” says Rushbrook, though he acknowledges you never know until race day. “Based on our computational fluid dynamics tools, scale wind-tunnel testing, and full-scale wind-tunnel testing \u2014\u00a0and the few on-track tests we’ve had\u00a0\u2014\u00a0we\u2019ve made a good move. But until the real race, we never know for sure, so there\u2019s always some level of nervousness.”<\/p>\n

Building Rushbrook’s confidence are new NASCAR aerodynamic rules, meaning every team\u00a0had to start from scratch. Under the hood, the NASCARs still will be powered by familiar ol’, push-rod V-8s (though restricted to 550 horsepower for big ovals and 750 horses for small tracks and road courses).<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

NASCAR hopes the Mustang-Camaro rivalry will jump-start sagging\u00a0ratings. And Ford hopes its pony car’s racing presence will help sell an all-electric crossover coming in 2020 \u2014\u00a0complete with fast-back Mustang design DNA.<\/p>\n

The e-crossover’s sound will be decidedly un-V-8-like, but Ford is determined to translate the Mustang’s personality into a speedy, Tesla-like EV.<\/p>\n

“We’re going to change a lot of people’s minds,” Ford global markets boss Jim Farley\u00a0has told investors<\/a>, promising a fast green ute that appeals to\u00a0more than tree-huggers.<\/p>\n

At the top of the go-fast pyramid will be Ford’s 2019\u00a0Mustang Funny Car.<\/p>\n

NHRA\u00a0Funny Cars are essentially Top Fuel slingshot dragsters with car bodies. Compared to the Mustang Cobra Jet dragster (also set to debut at the Winternationals) and its production-based engine, the Mustang Funny Car is a unique species. Over a mere\u00a01,000 feet, the earth-shaking, V-8-powered rocket\u00a0will reach 330 mph in less than the four seconds. It generates over 10,000-plus horsepower \u2014\u00a0more than the first five\u00a0rows of the Daytona 500 field combined\u00a0\u2014\u00a0from eye-watering nitro methane fuel.<\/p>\n

“NHRA is is so far removed from anything that it\u2019s difficult to use our analytical engine tools,” laughs Rushbrook, who says Ford Racing contributes\u00a0its drive-train technology to every other race series it competes\u00a0in. “They do their own engine works. We help them with aero only.”<\/p>\n

The first Mustang redesign\u00a0for Funny Car in almost a decade, the Mustang will line\u00a0up against entries from Dodge (the Charger Hellcat\u00a0introduced\u00a0last year<\/a>) and Chevy (Camaro run by NHRA legend John Force).<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s great,” smiles Rushbrook at the prospect of\u00a0Detroit’s Big Three going to war on the\u00a0drag strip.\u00a0“Competing against other OEMs is part of the reason we want to be in motor sports.”<\/p>\n

In addition to NASCAR, Mustang and Penske also will pair up on the other side of the globe for the\u00a0Virgin Australia Supercars Championship.<\/p>\n

Kiwi hot foot Scott McLaughlin will be defending his championship for Penske in the newly-badged Mustang Supercar. The ‘Stang replaces the outgoing Falcon nameplate though the underlying chassis and 650-horse, V-8 power-plant remain the same.<\/p>\n

For the most direct transfer\u00a0of race-to-street engineering, Ford is sending its production-based GT4 Mustang overseas this year. Similar to the car that has\u00a0dominated IMSA’s Sportscar Challenge series, the pony will thrill fans in Europe as well as Down Under.<\/p>\n

“The GT4 has a lot of direct relevance to our street program \u2014\u00a0it uses the\u00a0same car body\u00a0and minor modifications to suspension,” says Rushbrook.\u00a0“Like global street-car sales, it gets\u00a0global homologation so we can do one car, one design and it can be sold to race around the world.”<\/p>\n

Behind the Mustang juggernaut will be other Ford models, of course. The gorgeous Ford GT in IMSA GTLM racing and the the Ford Fiesta in off-road rallying.<\/p>\n

But a new era of Mustang performance\u00a0is leading a new era for Ford.<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s my passion and I absolutely love what we\u2019re doing,” says Rushbrook. Which is a good thing \u2014\u00a0because he’ll be wiping the tears from his nitro-stung\u00a0eyes in California Friday night to take the red eye to Daytona for Saturday qualifying.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A\u00a0pony shall lead them. Ford Motor Co. may be transitioning to an SUV and\u00a0pickup brand, but the iconic Mustang muscle car is set to be the performance face of the company from its new electric crossover in 2020 to a Mustang-dominated, global\u00a0racing lineup starting this year. The Mustang will debut this weekend at Daytona 500 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23436"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23436\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}