Ford has just revealed its most ambitious and extreme pony car yet. The Ford Mustang GTD is a wild horse designed alongside the company's Le Mans efforts that comes with more than 800 hp, an incredibly adjustable suspension, and a price tag that will make a Porsche 911 GT3 blush.
"This is a new approach for us," said Ford president and CEO Jim Farley. "We didn’t engineer a road car for the track, we created a race car for the road. Mustang GTD takes racing technology from our Mustang GT3 race car, wraps it in a carbon fibre Mustang body and unleashes it for the street." The exec then issued a challenge, saying that "I’ll take track time in a Mustang GTD against any other auto boss in their best road car."
Each 2025 Ford Mustang GTD will start as a standard Mustang shell before being sent to racecar builders Multimatic just outside of Toronto. Multimatic, which built the latest Ford GT and helped develop both this GTD and the GT3 racing car, will transform the car into the monster you see here.
We'll start with the body, which has had most of its steel panels replaced with carbon fibre. That includes the roof, fenders, hood, trunk, door sills, front splitter, and rear diffuser. You can also get carbon front and rear fascias as an option.
The body has been extensively reworked to improve aerodynamic performance, increasing downforce and ensuring the car stays cool. Ford offers an aero package that elevates that performance to even higher levels with a carbon undertray, active rear wing, and hydraulically controlled front flaps. Those active aero features aren't even found on the GT3 race car because they're not allowed.
Ford's Mustang GTD doesn't have a trunk. Remove the panel covering what would normally be there and instead of an empty cargo well, you'll find the semi-active inboard rear suspension, hydraulic control system, and transaxle cooling system. The suspension uses Multimatic's adaptive spool valve shock tech at all four corners, and it also has hydraulically adjustable dual-rate springs. Track Mode drops the car by 40 mm, while the new suspension pushes the wheels out by 100 mm. Ford says the 1:1 motion ratio of the race car rear suspension makes the car more precise on the track.
The supercharged 5.2L V8 under the carbon hood was developed specifically for the GTD. It gets a dry sump oil system to keep it lubricated during sustained cornering, and can spin to 7,500 rpm. Ford hopes to make more than 800 hp from the new engine, which will dump its exhaust through a new titanium active valve system.
A carbon fibre driveshaft sends power from the engine to a transaxle mounted in the rear. Putting the eight-speed box in the back allows for a 50/50 weight distribution and Ford said it picked the architecture based on lap time simulations and dyno testing.
If the go-fast bits aren't extreme enough, the cabin might be. The cockpit gets suede, leather, and carbon fibre, along with Recaro seats designed for track days. But the really cool bits are the optional 3D-printed paddle shifters, rotary dial, and serial plate. They're all made from titanium from melted-down bits of F-22 Raptor. You can order any colour you want, and Ford promises other personalization options.
The end result is a Ford Mustang with an MSRP of $300,000 U.S. That's $60,000 more than a Porsche 911 GT3 RS if you're looking for a reference. For that money, you'll get one heck of a Mustang, one that Ford says will break into the six-minute window at the Nurburgring in Germany. Seriously quick, and production will be seriously limited, though Ford didn't say just how many Multimatic can build. Expect deliveries to start in late 2024.
You may also like
