BIG NA V8 up front sending power to the rear through a manual 6 speed stick shift. If you've driven your share of Pony Cars, that basic recipe might sound as mandated and given as the Second Amendment. But what if we were to take an unassuming, off the shelf 2015 Mustang GT and stretch it out to pickup truck levels of width, give it side exit exhausts strategically placed to cook your thighs on every time you attempt to cross over the puffed out skirts, and give it springs stiffer than those on a 991 GT3... RS?
With springs set to 2.8Hz front and rear, not much separates the Mustang Gr.3 Road Car from the full blown race variant it homologates if you were to drive it down a Japanese Expressway... assuming you manage to squeeze through the vicegrip that are the toll gates unscathed. The engine that has been massaged into race spec for the Gr.3 car is dumped almost as–is into a road car; the power curves between the two cars being pixel for pixel identical to each other, with the only difference being 47 less HP at 502HP (374kW) in the "road" car. That means that the power curves become as sharp as the revised bonnet on the car, with just as many gaping holes in it as well. The low end torque ideal for highway passing that I had come to associate with a good Muscle Car has been entirely forsaken to focus all the ponies up top near its redline, uncorked in race trim to cut out at 8,000rpm. It's almost like driving a 5 Litre Rotary!
All this focus on track performance then, one should jolly well hope that it's all worth it when the Mustang can finally roam free on a racetrack.
Help...
Of course it isn't. Is this the first time you've read my reviews? It's called setting up expectations specifically just so you can betray them. Like the Mustang Gr.3 Road Car.
It starts out promising enough. The car's powertrain and suspension are both dizzyingly direct, responding the instant you twitch an extremity in your limbs. The racing brakes that the car comes standard with have a ferocious bite to them, chopping the lightened car down to speed quickly in conjunction to the added drag the body brings. As a result of all this, the Mustang can often feel some 200 kilos (441 pounds) lighter than its kerb mass of 1,500kg (3,307lbs), especially if you were to upgrade from the default Sport Hard tyres the car comes default with; the stiff suspension I daresay is set up to beg for racing slicks rather than suffer through street rubber. Remember, this thing has downforce and spring stiffness that exceed those of a hardcore 911, and so might be more prudent to think of this thing more like a FR track spec Porsche than anything a Mustang can reasonably feel like.
Turn in for a corner though, and you get a nostalgic combination of over and understeer that earlier Porsches are prone to as well, but for the opposite reason—The first thing I noticed was that the car is rather front heavy under trail braking, and booting up GT7 puts a figure to my misery, at 54:46 F:R. Not that I need much numbers to tell you the car has a bit of a challenging time diving for and nailing deeper apexes, such as the last corner of DT Seaside as an example, requiring drivers to set it up early for the corner rather than adjusting and adapting on the fly. On corner exits, the what feels like an anvil laden front end is prone to understeer on power, and the rear end, oversteer.
With the springs set to be stiffer than its stiffie for crowds, the Mustang G3RC fumbles and bumbles around even the microscopic shifts in elevation on a fictional, mirror–smooth circuit mid corner, almost as though this is the only trim of the sixth generation of Mustang to still come equipped with a solid rear axle, aiming for the crowds in the grandstands more than the road you point it at. The racecar stiff springs also unfortunately mean that the G3RC is also imbued with racecar like nervousness and snappiness without racecar levels of grip, requiring very quick and numerous corrections in a desperate fishtailing display before the car will consider your proposal of straightening out once it steps out on you. Compounded with the fact that it has a spikey power curve administered through GTS' notorious non–linear throttle, and the rear end stepping out on its driver is simply an inevitability when the car is pushed for a quick lap. I have never once felt comfortable being near the car's limits during race day as a result, much less have any semblance of fun while doing it. It's a stressful chore at best.
If you for some horse manure reason feel a compulsion to race fender to fender with your friends in a Mustang G3RC in spite of its snappy handling, then perhaps do it at a wide racetrack rather than on the public roads, counter–intuitively to what its name would suggest, because on the two lane wide Toukyo Central Loop, there is simply no passing possible with these widened cars, even if you have a pronounced pace advantage to the car in front of you. Case in point, Vic closed in a SECOND per lap on me around the mock C1 loop to sniff my diffuser with two laps to go, and despite me making little to no attempt to defend or block the driver I know to be faster than me due to my own discomfort behind the wheel, he couldn't get the pass done before the chequered flag was waved.
Help...
It's rubbish for the public roads. It's rubbish for racing. It's even rubbish for time attacks; the aforementioned 991 GT3 RS is some fifteen seconds quicker around the Nordschleife than the Mustang G3RC in Alex's testing. At 300k Credits in GT7 or 5k Mileage Points in GTS, it even costs markedly more than said 911, meaning that the usual saving grace of muscle cars, the "bang for the buck" argument, doesn't even apply to the Mustang G3RC. I've racked my head all week to come up with something nice to say about the car so as not to come across as a vengeful asshole, but I genuinely can't think of anything nice to say about the car.
Help...
All this focus on track performance then, one should jolly well hope that it's all worth it when the Mustang can finally roam free on a racetrack.
Help...
Of course it isn't. Is this the first time you've read my reviews? It's called setting up expectations specifically just so you can betray them. Like the Mustang Gr.3 Road Car.
It starts out promising enough. The car's powertrain and suspension are both dizzyingly direct, responding the instant you twitch an extremity in your limbs. The racing brakes that the car comes standard with have a ferocious bite to them, chopping the lightened car down to speed quickly in conjunction to the added drag the body brings. As a result of all this, the Mustang can often feel some 200 kilos (441 pounds) lighter than its kerb mass of 1,500kg (3,307lbs), especially if you were to upgrade from the default Sport Hard tyres the car comes default with; the stiff suspension I daresay is set up to beg for racing slicks rather than suffer through street rubber. Remember, this thing has downforce and spring stiffness that exceed those of a hardcore 911, and so might be more prudent to think of this thing more like a FR track spec Porsche than anything a Mustang can reasonably feel like.
Turn in for a corner though, and you get a nostalgic combination of over and understeer that earlier Porsches are prone to as well, but for the opposite reason—The first thing I noticed was that the car is rather front heavy under trail braking, and booting up GT7 puts a figure to my misery, at 54:46 F:R. Not that I need much numbers to tell you the car has a bit of a challenging time diving for and nailing deeper apexes, such as the last corner of DT Seaside as an example, requiring drivers to set it up early for the corner rather than adjusting and adapting on the fly. On corner exits, the what feels like an anvil laden front end is prone to understeer on power, and the rear end, oversteer.
With the springs set to be stiffer than its stiffie for crowds, the Mustang G3RC fumbles and bumbles around even the microscopic shifts in elevation on a fictional, mirror–smooth circuit mid corner, almost as though this is the only trim of the sixth generation of Mustang to still come equipped with a solid rear axle, aiming for the crowds in the grandstands more than the road you point it at. The racecar stiff springs also unfortunately means that the G3RC is also imbued with racecar like nervousness and snappiness without racecar levels of grip, requiring very quick and numerous corrections in a desperate fishtailing display before the car will consider your proposal of straightening out once it steps out on you. Compounded with the fact that it has a spikey power curve administered through GTS' notorious non–linear throttle, and the rear end stepping out on its driver is simply an inevitability when the car is pushed for a quick lap. I have never once felt comfortable being near the car's limits during race day as a result, much less have any semblance of fun while doing it. It's a stressful chore at best.
If you for some horse manure reason feel a compulsion to race fender to fender with your friends in a Mustang G3RC in spite of its snappy handling, then perhaps do it at a wide racetrack rather than on the public roads, counter–intuitively to what its name would suggest, because on the two lane wide Toukyo Central Loop, there is simply no passing possible with these widened cars, even if you have a pronounced pace advantage to the car in front of you. Case in point, Vic closed in a SECOND per lap on me around the mock C1 loop to sniff my diffuser with two laps to go, and despite me making little to no attempt to defend or block the driver I know to be faster than me due to my own discomfort behind the wheel, he couldn't get the pass done before the chequered flag was waved.
Help...
It's rubbish for the public roads. It's rubbish for racing. It's even rubbish for time attacks; the aforementioned 991 GT3 RS is some fifteen seconds quicker around the Nordschleife than the Mustang G3RC in Alex's testing. At 300k Credits in GT7 or 5k Mileage Points in GTS, it even costs markedly more than said 911, meaning that the usual saving grace of muscle cars, the "bang for the buck" argument, doesn't even apply to the Mustang G3RC. I've racked my head all week to come up with something nice to say about the car so as not to come across as a vengeful asshole, but I genuinely can't think of anything nice to say about the car.
Help...
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