Note: This continues the story and characters from Carless in Nashville, Talisman, and fried chicken, at the crossroads and Highway star. — JB
Drama McHourglass comes by her sobriquet honestly; she commands and displays her uncompressed emotional range with the cut-crystal clarity and terrifying sonic power of an early Telarc compact disc. This time, her voice in my DROID3’s speaker was pianoissimo, but I held the phone a bit away from my ear, knowing that she could summon up fortissimo possibile with no more warning than one gets from the New York Philharmonic.
“It’s just that… it’s just that…” Her lyric contralto broke into a sob. I have to admit that I wasn’t all that far away from crying myself. We’d parted ways, without so much as touching hands, more than a day before. My thoughts had followed her on the long road from Columbus to Nashville. “It’s just that… I just wish…” Wait a minute. Was that light throbbing in the background the idle of a 3.7-liter Duratec? Why hadn’t she returned her rental car?
I had just entered my teens when the first season of Voltron appeared on television, which meant I was more than old enough to scoff at the show’s unchanging basic plot. I mean… come on! Fighting the enemy with the five separate lions never works. The lions always get their asses kicked, complete with a worrisome shot of the one with the girl in it hitting a rock or cliff face really hard, the situation always becomes desperate, and the team always ends up forming Voltron to save the day.
Those of you with a quick grasp of Eighties history will realize that turning thirteen in 1984 also means that 2011 is the year in which I turn, or turned, forty. This fact was far more terrifying than anything the Lion Force had ever faced, so for my Saturday-night birthday party I had called on five women to stand, Voltron-like, between me and the alien threat. The Black Lion would be played by my ex-wife, who had graciously agreed to attend the event and bring my son for the first few hours. The volatile Red Lion would be Vodka McBigbra, hostess and planner. The Green Lion was my household manager, a curvaceous Italian in her early thirties who keeps asking why I haven’t given her a nickname yet. We’ll save that for later and just call her Green Lion. It’s more fun that way. Another Italian, a taller and brasher woman with whom I’d had a short but disastrous dalliance a while back, would be the Yellow Lion.
That left one spot open, and all true Voltron fans know that said spot is occupied by Princess Allura. I swallowed my pride, picked up the phone, and begged Drama to be my princess. There was only one problem: her not-so-trusty ’96 Taurus wasn’t up to the eight-hundred-mile roundtrip. She agreed to rent a car. Having booked a subcompact, she duly caught a ride to the rental office. The fellow working there took one look at her and had them pull around a delivery-mileage 2012 Mustang in basic black. Her first call to me from the road was a rapid-fire barrage of illegal vignettes: “Oh my God, Jack, it’s so fast… I was racing a bright blue car with a wing… then I swerved through traffic… hundred and twenty miles per hour… had the gas all the way down in the turn… never giving it back, I swear. I’m never giving it back.” She covered the distance between Nashville and Columbus in about five hours — not quite Alex Roy pace, but not for the timid either. She’d agreed to sleep on the couch the night before the party, but some time after one in the morning I heard the front door click, the whirr of a starter, and the Duratec’s uncouth scream as she hit redline in third on the way out of the neighborhood.
My experience with Ford’s current Duratec Mustang has been less than trouble-free, but surely this will be the affordable enthusiast car of 2020’s used market. It can be made to run thirteens with very little effort and it satisfies in nearly every way one might wish. The Genesis Coupe, which was supposed to have been the car to have for the entry-level driver, simply doesn’t compete. For once in this life, the “real thing” costs less and delivers more. Drama’s Mustang didn’t appear to have a single option on it, but from her perspective it was just perfect.
“You know,” I told her as we waited in line for lunch at Katzinger’s downtown, “I ran the Shelby GT500 around a racetrack recently. Five hundred and fifty horsepower. As I approached one-thirty on the back straight, with only ice-cold determination and incandescent skill separating me from a fiery demise…”
“My Mustang spins the back tires,” she interrupted. “How much would it cost me to buy one? I wonder if they would just go ahead and sell me this car.”
“As I was saying,” I resumed, with perhaps slightly less confidence than when I’d begun our conversation, “I was at a point where either the Corvette or I had to hit the brakes. But we both knew that only one of us had the unquenchable will to…”
“I knew a guy with a Corvette once,” Drama interrupted again. “If I saw him, I would race him in my Mustang and win. I could win races easily. I don’t mind driving fast. I don’t get scared. You should let me race your race car for you so you could have some trophies.” This fucking convo was going nowhere.
Cometh the evening, cometh the party. My two-and-a-half-year-old son arrived, dapper in a blue blazer and a toddler-sized Pat Metheny T-shirt. He sang “hap birfday daddy” into a Shure SM58 and strummed my Doves In Flight a bit. Fifty-something guests trickled in. Chef Carl prepared forty-five steaks while the Green and Red Lions fussed over the side dishes. I’d lined up some kick-ass musicians for the night — a Guitar Center contest winner, a fellow who’d played bass for Johnny Cash, my brother, some local heroes — and we played everything from “Equinox” to “Baker Street” while some friend’s of Vodka’s set up a temporary stripper pole in the other room. “I wore panties, which I don’t normally do,” another friend said, “because I hate girls who rub the pole naked.”
Ten o’clock. My son left, I had somewhere between twelve and sixteen shots of vodka, the “Evil Robot” amplifier was turned up, the smoke alarm went off in the house, the Yellow Lion ran out of the house crying, the stripper pole ripped out of the ceiling and Drama McHourglass herself caught it right before it smashed my favorite (by which I mean my only) Chihuly, three men and one woman all individually tried to get the Green Lion to head upstairs with them, my brother drank an entire bottle of Red Stag, the “fall back” time change came and went, somebody brought out a vintage bullet microphone and started beatboxing, and Chef Carl rewarded himself for his efforts by killing some Bordeaux and passing out on a couch. At 3:48 in the morning, my brother and I were rapping Ice Cube and Mc Ren’s parts, respectively, of “The Grand Finale” (from The D.O.C.’s stellar 1989 release No One Can Do It Better) when the county sheriffs arrived. Thus endeth the party. When the cops departed, I snuck upstairs to see what was happening in my bedroom. As I’d hoped, Drama and Vodka were snuggled together in my bed; unfortunately for me, they were sound asleep. I went back downstairs and started drinking water.
I was sullenly sober by the time the last guest left late Sunday afternoon. Drama packed her Mustang and disappeared. Now was when we really could have used Voltron — to clean up the mess — but we only had two lions left. All of a sudden I felt very much forty years old. The party had cost far too much money to throw, my neighbors were no doubt furious with me, and my Town Car had sunk sidewall-deep into the lawn. The real world was calling.
I’d asked Drama to call me when she got home, but she didn’t. Not that I really expected her to. It’s my persistent mistake, you see, to overestimate how much I mean to this girl. This woman; she just turned thirty, and I dimly recall that being nearly as bad as forty. As it turned out, I didn’t hear from her until the next night. As our conversation took its predictable course and she finally burst into a Shostakovichian flurry of percussive tears, I allowed myself yet again to think, she misses you, at least.
“It’s just that… it’s just that…” It’s just that I love you, I silently supplied. It’s just that you’re the most wonderful, sensitive, attractive man I’ve ever known.
“It’s just that…” she wailed, as I slow-faded the Droid away from my ear in anticipation of the symphony’s conclusion, “I don’t want to give the Mustang back.”
Entertaining as usual.
and Katzingers is outstanding! Zingerman’s in Ann Arbor, eat your heart out.
Best Deli west of New York!
Now was when we really could have used Voltron — to clean up the mess —
The mental image of Voltron doing household chores alone was worth the read. Thank you!
It seems that, much like a wild birthday party – or the Genesis Device – a base Mustang can make you feel…”young, as when the world was new.”
kudos on the Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan reference.
I can see Voltron with an apron and maid’s hat on, sweeping a broom!
This fucking convo was going nowhere.
Yup had those covenversations with women.
Love what you write, Amigo. And you’ve increased my lust for a base Mustang.
A good read, Jack. My wife and I are inching ever-closer to 30, and even now, well ahead of the age when men usually do such things, I have an almost visceral urge to buy a new, base Mustang. The budget (and my better half) unequivocally say “no way.” Just like they also said “no way” to a similar urge I had to buy a low (40,000) mile Crown Vic Police Interceptor from a repair shop in Kentucky recently.
It’s like finally having juuuust enough money to almost make those boyhood dreams reality, but then realizing how un-adult and potentially irresponsible it would be for our finances and our son’s future. I relate very well to the line about feeling very much 40 years old. More and more, the 18 year old guy in my brain is being forced to come to grips with the nearly 26 year old man the rest of me has become, with a full-time job, a wife, a newborn son, a mortgage, a pile of bills every month, and all the rest of the (mostly crappy) trimmings of adult life. Someone told me it’s the “quarter-life crisis.” I’d buy that.
When the newborn turns three years old, life becomes awesome. Dreams of fast cars are nothing compared to playing legos with your child and pew-pewing each others creations to bits.
I feel a bit for Mr. Baruth (or at least his current writing persona) in that I doesn’t appear from his writing that he’s found the joy of making fart jokes with his son. I hope I’m wrong; A son is only young once, but there’s always hot women. Jack would make an awesome dad if he has the time.
Good post. I enjoy the heck out of our son most of the time even now. But I definitely look forward to the days when he’s able to play with Daddy a little more.
And for the record, I’m betting this is Jack’s alter-ego storybook persona. He seems like he’d be a cool dad. My Dad played music a lot when I was the age his son is now, and he was an awesome dad.
Most days, I pick my son up from school after work and we play with his airplanes and trains for a couple of hours. He’s broken all of my 1:18 Porsche models, which would have infuriated me a decade ago but doesn’t matter much now.
The current issue we’re facing is that he assumes that I can somehow produce “more” of whatever he likes. So… an ambulance goes by and he laughs.
“Ambulance!”
“Yes, it sure is.”
“More ambulance.”
“I’m not sure I can do that.”
“More ambulance… please.”
“More ambulance…please.”
That’s hilarious! My mind is gonna get blown when my kid learns to talk, I have a feeling.
And somehow, it reminds me of the age-old SNL “More Cowbell.”
“More ambulance… please.”
If you’re handy, your kids will think you can do anything. *My son, my only son, whom I love, Moshe, was about 3 years old when he handed me a banana broken in half and said, “Abba, fix?”
Mo and his wife will, God willing, have their first child next spring. My father, o’b’m’, said grandchildren were the only reason to have kids in the first place. My uncle, also deceased, used to say “15 minutes of pleasure and a lifetime of regret”.
I kid, I kid, about my kids. Actually, now that they’re adults, the purpose of the endeavor seems a bit clearer. It’s very cool to see your adult kids act like grown ups.
*I’ve called him that since he was a boy. Not sure just quite how old he was when he realized the Highway 61 Revisited aspect of the biblical reference.
@Ronnie
You’re right about the handy part with kids. My daughter pretty much believed I could fix anything by the time she was 5 or 6.
You wont realize it now, but 26 isnt even remotely close to 30, and nothing like what you will feel like at 40! :)
Enjoy your new role as family man, and dont sweat the toys. Planning well now will reward you in a decade or so when you actually CAN spend money on toys without it being irreponsible.
This is also why I encourage my rapidly growing “children” to wait until they are well into thier 30s before even thinking about taking on a spouse, newborns, mortgages, and everything else people for some reason think they NEED in thier 20s. In other words, do I say, not as I did… LOL
“This is also why I encourage my rapidly growing “children” to wait until they are well into thier 30s before even thinking about taking on a spouse, newborns, mortgages, and everything else people for some reason think they NEED in thier 20s.”
Well, this is Tennessee, where we yank ’em up young. If you ain’t got a plot of land, a pickup truck, and a passel of young ‘uns by the time you’re 25, you’re a no-good Commie.
I kid. Kinda. My wife and I dated for six years, a couple of them while we were in high school, and by the time we got married when I was 22, we were the “old couple” and practically everyone we graduated school with had already married. Some (predictably so, I might add,) had already married *and divorced.* When we had our son, it was like everyone we grew up with were telling us, “Finally you guys have a kid…jeez, took you long enough.” So here we were looking at our surroundings and thinking we were taking things nice and slow!
hahaha, I hear ya… my ex-wife was from Kentucky, so when we got married at 19/20 her family was worried she’d never find a man! And my wife now also got married to her first husband when she was 18, shes from West Virginia… something about the country!!
I really enjoy your writing, Jack. Actually, the more episodes like this you put to pen, the more I’m beginning to think you might somehow be related to Dr. Bud over at Autoextremist. You two seem to have alot in common — separated at birth, or just siblings?!?!?!?
@Banger …. I have felt your pain before. Now that the kids have been gone a while, I treated myself to a low mileage red w/tan leather 2001 WS6 convertible with the six-speed. In fact, it was the better-half’s idea. So just remember — this too shall pass!!
My boss, an owner of a WS6 Camaro (admittedly with the hard top) did this for himself several years ago. Bought a 1998 new in 1999, I think. It is his daily driver, but also very much his pride and joy. He was nearing 40 when he made that purchase. I reckon maybe if I’m lucky, I will be in his shoes when I hit my mid-’30s. Hoping they don’t screw up the looks of the Mustang too much by then, although a more robust six-speed would be forever welcome.
What kind of races is she going to win in your Neon?
Races on tracks with curves.
Guess which car is the winningest car in history among SCCA mixed-manufacturer classes?
…..sounds like a trick question….Swift or Van Deimen is probably right, but I think you mean production cars, so I’ll try British Leyland…..tons of wins in the small bore class in the 50’s, 60’s, 70’s, and now in vintage racing.
The conventional answer for the “modern era” is the Neon, which won for years in Showroom Stock and Production classes. For all the years in which the Neon was eligible for SSC, it was competitive.
Saw a few guys rally Neons. They were always pretty reliable and durable little turds. Ford has their Fiesta R2 rally program out now. Makes for a reasonably easy way to get into rally in the US. I don’t think you care for the dirt though.
The scary part: I’m the same age as JB and I too could easily rap the correct lyrics to anything from The D.O.C. or N.W.A. However I have no ex’s and certainly have never had a stripper pole in my house… at least not yet.
However just two weeks ago I bought a nearly new ’03 Nissan 350Z Touring (in orange no less). Is it the sign of a mid-life crisis? Maybe… but right now I don’t care as I wanted one for a long time. And I have been smiling ever since!
Fantastic, as usual.
Two friends and I rented a 2011 Mustang V6 convertible for our trip to Key West this past March. It impressed me in many ways, and that’s saying something because I am an insufferable German car snob. It even came in its own American-smurfy rendition of BMW’s Laguna Seca Blue.
Same here – I get Mustangs as rentals a few times a year. I like them enough that the thought of kicking all my old convertible crockes out of the garage and buying a shiny new Mustang to sit next to my 328iT.
The current 300hp V6 is deeply impressive, even with the live axle.
Great story. I always enjoy a good Jack Baruth tale.
Very interesting read and the fact that it’s on the verge of being NSFW is all the better. haha.
terrifying sonic power of an early Telarc compact disc
The percussion on Telarc’s recording of Lewis Lane & Atlanta S.O. doing Aaron Copland will make you jump out of your seat.
Got any of the Sheffield Lab recordings? Kodo drummers?
The golden days of audio…I loved buying the so called half speed masters and playing them on my B&O which I still own…now nobody cares about sonic quality…its all downloads…non of which have the depth and clarity of a real recording…
Those of you with a quick grasp of Eighties history will realize that turning thirteen in 1984 also means that 2011 is the year in which I turn, or turned, forty.
In 1984, I turned 30 and my second of three children was born. Not sure how much he remembers of it, but I can say that I watched the Detroit Tigers win a World Series with my son on my lap, sitting in a vintage box seat from (but not at) Tiger Stadium.
Happy Birthday Jack!
It seems like your party was a blast. This article is also wonderfully written, with many excellent references to television, film, and music.
With that being said, I have to say that the new Mustang totally sucks. Even the Boss version of the Mustang sucks, because it still uses a stagecoach rear axle.
Muscle and Pony cars stopped being cool long ago, and they will never be cool again. It probably has something to do with the automakers efforts to fill rental car fleets with them. To make the average fat loser comfortable, they gave them wide flat seats and soft suspensions.
The muscle car is dead. Long live the rally car!
In 2020 the best used car value for a performance car will probably be today’s best new car value for a performance car – the 2011 Lancer Evo 10 – it can’t be touched for the price.
Different strokes, different folks.
The Mustang’s oft-lambasted live rear axle is the very model of simplicity and toughness. No CV joints or fancy rear suspension bits to screw up with age and miles (and tons of hard launches when someone in an EVO X pulls up next to you at a light). And the Mustang still owns the IRS competition from its fellow muscle cars out on the track because Ford has invested a lot of time and know-how into getting the most from this setup…to the point that it still whoops the supposedly better IRS setup employed by Dodge and Chevy…at least it’ll do so on all but the roughest paved tracks, where axle hop may become a concern without proper suspension upgrades.
You can have your Lancer. I have little confidence Mitsubishi will still be a presence in the American marketplace when your 2020 timeframe comes around.
@SKUSA:
Clearly, you haven’t driven a 2011+ Mustang. Even the V6 rental fleet queens drive nicely. I had one for a rental for several days on Oahu earlier this year.
Oh, and I drive a BMW 330i. I know what a proper rear driver feels like and I’d happily buy a CPO V8 Mustang coupe with a 6-speed. Make mine silver.
Right because nothing is cooler than owning a rental car.
Your BMW is almost as soft as a Mustang, so that isn’t saying much.
Have you driven an Evo before? The car punishes and abuses the driver, yet rewards you with insane levels of performance.
The Evo is hardcore. There is nothing hardcore about a Mustang or a 330, that is the difference.
I haven’t driven an Evo but I’ve driven a WRX STi, which I’d figure to be relatively similar. It felt like a $17k economy car with a huge turbocharger. Boring! I’d rather have a BMW or a modern musclecar.
@SKUSA_boy
For the track, nothing beats a live axle get over it! Last I checked the Boss and especially the LS version are not entended for blvd comfort although its shocks come with something call ‘comfort settings’, a mustang 1st, and of course you know a bad or buckboard ride comes from damping, not how an axle tube or knuckles hang onto the body. Top heavy, front bias Boss’ are walking on base supercars… where you been buddy???
“For the track, nothing beats a live axle” ?????
Right… That’s why formula 1 cars use live rear axles…
‘Cause they have mid-engines and therefore transaxles. Add a live axle and prop shaft and you add like 5ft to the wheelbase. You know this, come on are you testing me? Not saying live axles gives a tremendous advantange but advantage none the less. If you compare like cars, weight, weight bias and HP etc, the live axle gives a definite track advantange. The IRS Cobra Mustang sucked without a doubt. The M3 got dusted by the Boss by a huge margin and they’re virtually identical except rear axle choice.
I think it is far more credible to say that a SMOOTH track minimizes a live axles disadvantages (unsprung wieght) while maximizing its advantages (no camber change, sheer toughness and simplicity). When you have a car lowered and stiffened to the point that it works well on a track, the live axle does indeed work pretty well. As long as the track is smooth…
But in the real world, the one with BUMPS and especially bumpy corners and camber changes and potholes and all the other things that make real world roads not at all like nice smooth racetracks, a live axle gets a bit, uh, unruly. Ford has done great things with the Mustang’s suspension, but ultimately it is a pretty crude device. Which I think is all part of the charm! BMWs magic is in delivering amazing handling while still riding quite smoothly – none of THAT particular magic in a Mustang.
As I mentioned, I have had a number of Mustang rentals, probably four weeks of seat time in the new 2011s since they came out – very fun car, but no way in hell would one keep up with my 328iT on a twisty windy backroad. Well, maybe Jack actually COULD make one go down a windy road as fast as a BMW, but mere mortals would chicken out. The Mustang just does not inspire confidence the way the BMW does. The steering is not as sharp, it would be bouncing and dancing all over the place, and the brakes suck in comparison. On a track, the Mustang would run away and hide from the BMW, all that extra hp. At least until you cook the brakes.
As to Boss Mustang vs. M3, there is that minor issue of the Mustang having a little more hp and a LOT more torque, while wieghing less than the M3 if I recall correctly. And a smooth track allowing it to maximize those advantages.
And Happy Birthday Jack!
@krhodes1
Around 3 seconds is huge gap for such a short track like Laguna. Remember the Boss loses torque over the 5.0 GT and the M3 is plenty torquey as it runs about equal with the GT but maybe not so much on paper. Damping is what the major difference is between the GT and Boss. Getting the damping right counteracts unsprung weight issues and that’s what’s never been seen from a factory Mustang. Shocking I know. As far as the LRA being unsettled when things get rough, watch the Youtube/Insideline “Spy Videos” at Nurburgring of the 2013 GT500 test mule and 2012 Mercedes-Benz SL and while the GT500 does dance a bit on the uneven pavement @0:52, the Merc dances just as bad @0:11 on the same spot. Explain that one?
@CJinSD
If it was just about cornering that’d be one thing (like on a skidpad) but as suspensions unload/compress under hard braking/accelerating combined with hard cornering and many combinations of elevation drops/risers, it complicates things a bit and you get weird geometry. Front engine performance cars went to IRS because it was superior to the LRA tech in the late ’50s. Leafsprings for one. They’re still preferred because of widely held beliefs/wivestails. Like I said tires were narrow and tall how fat were roll bars? Today the DeDions exists in one of the world’s fastest go-cart like Caterhams. How many front engine/trans supercars are left that can take advantage of a DeDion barring a transaxle adaptation? I think the Caterham is about the only supercar that’s still front engine/trans and a dedicated racer. Proper damping counteract unsprung weight issues and I’m not saying LRA is always better especially when it’s not a dedicated track car but the LRA in Mustangs is underrated.
I’m no Mustang fan, but there is nothing that an Evo can do as well as a Mustang GT on dry pavement. Car and Driver held a ‘Best Handling Car for Under $40,000’ comparison test recently, and they picked the Evo as their favorite. That didn’t make it remotely as fast as the Mustang GT(never mind the Boss). The Mustang lapped Grattan Raceway 1.7 seconds faster than the Evo. The GT was even faster than the Evo when the straightaways were eliminated from the sector times. As for 2020, there won’t be many Evos around to laugh at. They’re pretty disposable, and lots of cheap tech won’t be a friend to people who try to hang onto their rally car dreams past the sell-by date. I don’t share DenverMike’s opinion that a solid axle isn’t a liability on a road course, but the Evo isn’t good enough to take advantage of having IRS against the Mustang. Perhaps it can run with the rental car V6 automatic Mustangs. Perhaps.
@CJinSD
Road courses are usually smooth. The Nurburging not so much but the 2013 GT500 test mule handled it without much drama. Thing is IRS is really overrated anymore. The fatter the roll bar, the less ‘independant’ they become and can kick out almost as bad as LRAs. The fatter and lower profile tires get, the more they ride on the edges when pushed too hard as opposed the LRA that keeps optimal contact patch with a compressed/unloaded suspension. For spirted driving with mostly static suspension compression on rough public roads, IRS is slightly better but not on a road course. It was all win/win when tires were as tall as they were wide, for IRS but slowly IRS has become a track liability from an all out racing aspect.
DenverMike,
Were that the case, it would be the work of an afternoon for racing car designers to draw up a deDion suspension that is compatible with a transaxle, reduces the unsprung-weight disadvantage of a live axle, and keeps the wheels perpendicular to the track. They don’t because having the wheels perpendicular to the track isn’t as advantageous as having camber gain that compensates for the distortion of the tire carcass during cornering. Even a very stiff antiroll bar doesn’t disrupt grip of the offside wheel from a bump as much as a solid axle does either. Because of IRS advantages in geometry, unsprung weight, and segregation of disruptive forces, deDion suspensions stopped being common in dedicated racing cars in the late 1950s. Solid axles were similarly superseded by IRS long before mid-engines and transaxles were derigueur. Solid axles can be made to work very effectively through decades of development, much the way pushrods and carburetors are tremendously effective in the hands of NASCAR teams, but it doesn’t mean they’re ideal.
@CJinSD
You’re missing the best thing about Evo itself. It’s not what it can do in stock trim,its the fact that it is cheap and easy to modify.
An ECU reflash will have you dynoing at 350hp at the wheels. An intake and exhaust, and another reflash with a more aggressive tune gets you 400hp at the wheels. Plus you are putting that down through all four wheels so it is power you can actually use.
A more aggressive turbo can easily get you 500hp at the wheels on the stock engine internals. So for less than $4000 you can get over 500hp out of the car.
If cost is no object and you are willing to upgrade the engine internals, well there are 800hp cars out there.
As far as C&D getting better lap times out of the Mustang, well that might be true. However that is only one driver (or a small group of drivers) on one track. It doesn’t mean that the Evo might not be faster with different drivers on the same track, or on a different track.
Also, they used an Evo X MR, when they should have used the lighter and faster GSR version instead.
By the way, there are plenty of 2003 Evo 8s still out there. They sell for way more than 2003 Mustang GTs do. Since there are plenty of 8 year old Evo 8s out there, I see no reason why there will not be plenty of 2011 Evo 10s around in 2020, and the reason they are “disposable” is because the people that own them are a hardcore bunch. They actually drive them hard. Sometimes they wrap them around trees. The old people driving Mustang GTs don’t go in for that sort of thing.
@SK, not sure if you really believe this or were just looking to stir it up, but I couldnt help but add my two cents. Obviously, you totally missed the point. Maybe you just bought a new Evo and still feel the need to justify your purchase??
First off, the Evo is indeed an amazing performance car, no doubt. But its not a bargain… its $40k. It is also a Mitsubishi, which arent generally known for longevity. Tuning it to 400-500HP isnt going to improve that record. In 2020 there will surely be a few of them left running around, but they will not be a bargain, no more than 2003 EVOs are bargains today. They will just be expensive, delicate used performance cars that only true die-hard fans will buy. Just like relatively few people trust buying a used EVO or STI today.
Second, you are comparing the performance of a $40k rally car to a base Mustang that sells in the mid-20s new, and will be freely available for around $5k in 2020. And even then, will have relatively few problems. Now the current model WRX, that is a peformance bargain. For around $25k you get 90% of the performance of the STI or EVO. Its affordable, relatively reliable, and is more than enough for what you need on the street. And its still tunable if you want more.
Your post makes you sound like a car snob. There is no reason why EVOs and Mustangs cant both be cool. I can appreciate the fun in hot hatches, rally cars, muscle cars, classics, whatever.
I don’t have an Evo, however if I were in the market for a new car it is one of the few things I would consider.
By the way an Evo X GSR is only $34000 dollars. In 2020 there probably won’t be that much of a price gap between it and a used Mustang that was formerly a rental car.
At the same time, the Mustang will always be a car that was sold to rental car fleets. It will always be a car driven by old people, teenage girls, and usually sold with an automatic gearbox. Oh, and don’t forget about all the convertibles they sell with slushboxes in them.
It’s not about the price. It’s about the fact that the Mustang is soft, and the people who buy them are soft. The Evo is a no compromise car. It forces the driver to suffer in exchange for driving it.
There was a time when you had to pay for your performance in more ways than one. Today that is just not necessary. I get where you are coming from, a car that rewards proper skill and bites you for your mistakes has a certain charm to it. You could argue that it separates the men from the boys. And I like a stiff ride as well. But for the majority of folks who have to balance a life’s worth of baggage, a one trick pony like an Evo is just too limiting. If you are at a point where you can pull that off, great. Enjoy it while you can. As far as the live axle in the Mustang, it really is not a big deal. It performs well and suits the car. And a good setup is better than a poor/weak IRS. Don’t judge the book by its cover. Look at BMWs for example. For years they rode on front strut suspensions. Hell, a Civic had wishbones. But despite the “old” simple strut design, they were the benchmark fro driving dynamics.
Enjoy your forties – they’re the best decade of your life. A combination of a. By now being smart enough to know what you can and cannot get way with, and b. Enough youth left to have a hell of a good time while enjoying a.
5-0 is the beginning of the end. and 6-0 is when it starts to accelerate.
Uh, not so fast. I am 64 next week and feel no decline yet. As a matter of fact I am going to take my 07 Mustang GT 5 speed out for a ride tomorrow and run through the gears wide open a few times. I spent the week in Texas beating around in a Camry rental on a business trip, what a drag. It is great to come home and see the Mustang in the garage. Never get tired of it. I am getting tired of the incessant whining about the live rear axle, get over it! 99.9% of the time, I am unaware of it. Every time I see a Camaro or Challenger, I cannot get over how huge they look. IRS cannot cover that up.
Funny, the part about Drama makes me think of Mystery’s routine(s) for picking up strippers and how you have to short-circuit their “stripper programming”, or they’ll only ever see you as a $.
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Also: Happy Birthday!
Happy b’day Jack, incidentally will turn 43 in a matter of days from now. Can clearly recall the horror of turning 40 though, worse than the dentist’s seat.
Now I have even worse nightmares about turning to 50, probably I will say the same about 60, when I get there.
As your kids grow older though, in a way it compensates; you feel like “young again” with them.
And I know buying a 991 will also help, since it has been my childhood dream, if I can reach it by 45 (median age of Porsche buyers is 42). Although I am way too much worried about the electromechanical steering I think I will give it a try.
Otherwise a Cayman S for me (or as you’ve suggested a Boxter S) will see…..
“F**k a car, I’ll do a motherf**king walk-by” – Eazy E.
This post definitely brought me back to my childhood. I will say that I hope my 40th is as eventful as yours sounded.
40 huh? no big deal – 52, now that’s the shits!