- Aug 24, 2000
- 4,153
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Notice: This is a lengthy (but fun) story and there will be No Cliff's Notes so don't ask.
Either read it or don't.
Prelude:
All of my life I have gravitated toward American Muscle. I currently own a 2008 Mustang GT/CS that over the years I have done a little bit here and a little bit there to. It's received a supercharger, fuel system, intake, exhaust, gears, and suspension upgrades. It's at a point now where it's a pretty stout machine pushing out 520-ish horsepower. It does not fear Shelby's or SRT-8's or SS's or Z-06's but everything has its limits and here is where the story begins...
Chapter 1 - How It All Began:
My wife is a registered nurse. She works in the ER at our local hospital. Currently she is enrolled in a Nurse Practitioner program with about a year left to go. For those that don't know, a Nurse Practitioner is like a hybrid Nurse/Physician kind or thing. Because the Docs see that she is going through the NP program, she's gotten in good with some of them at work. A few of them have taken her under their proverbial wings as it were... Which basically makes here one of the "inner circle". Why is it important?... Stay tuned...
Chapter 2 - Career Opportunities:
Doctors - especially ER doctors who have invested wisely over the years and have lots of money - love their toys... expensive toys.... GTR-type-toys... So one day at work a certain Doc that my wife is in good with comes in talking about his new car he just bought. We'll refer to him as "Dr. G" to protect the innocent. "Dr. G" is talking about how he has a new car and it's "pretty fast".. well... My wife - who is as proud of our Mustang as I am - starts in about how we need to race and there's no way Dr. G's car could take ours....
Keep in mind my wife has no idea about cars other than they have 4 wheels and use gas... so a GTR to her might as well be a Nissan Sentra... So now the stage is set...
Chapter 3 - Someone Set Us Up The Bomb!:
I'm at home perfecting my latest mash getting ready to brew when my wife calls from work all proud of herself to tell me about a race she has gotten all set up.
ME: O-rly?
HER: Yeah um it's with a Doctor I work with.. he's want to race your Mustang.. He's got a GT.. something (she turns away from the phone and I hear mumbling in the background).. He says it's a GTR
ME: silence...
HER: Hello?
ME: He's got a "What?"
HER: A GTR (mumbles in background..."is that right") Yeah, a GTR.
ME: Nope... Not interested... sorry honey, that thing is made to go against all-wheel-drive Lambo's.. Not Hot-Rodded Mustangs... Not even on my best day..
So I go back to brewing and I think to myself - "Yeah, but it sure would be cool to see that thing run..." Hey,.. It's like a Unicorn.. people claim they exist and they're magical, but no one has ever seen one before in the wild...
So I text her back and say I'm in... I know it's gonna hurt my pride but I have to know what a GTR is really all about...
Chapter 4 - D-DAY:
Everything is set and "Dr. G" brings in his GTR to work... I spend the day swapping out supercharger pulleys to my 8PSI, loading my race tune, and swapping out tires and rims. When his shift ends (Sunday morning). It's on...
Sunday morning arrives and my wife and I hop into the Stang and roll on down to the hospital.. We pull in the back parking lot and there it sits - under a car cover... I can tell by the shape what's under there.. We go inside and Dr. G is just finishing up some paperwork and we all walk out together. I help with the car cover and there it is in jet black.... A Unicorn with a big red "R" on the nose staring back at me...
I take a while to check out the car.. It's got Brembo's all around (6 pots up front and 4 in the rear). Two piece cross-drilled rotors - the rears are as big as my fronts! He's got it wrapped in Nitto INVO's up front and 555r drag radials in the rear. Out of the back are four, count-em, 4 - 4inch exhaust tips turned blue from the heat. Around front under the hood sits the 6-cyl mill with 4" dia plumbing gone everywhere and a giant pair of HKS blow off valves for the twin snails sitting underneath.
Dr. G proceeds to tell me about the car and how he bought it from the previous owner who at 400miles had the engine pulled and sent off to AMS for a complete rebuild.. It becomes obvious that this is not just any GTR - this is a built GTR with about $25,000.00 of engine work poured into it... To make a long story sort, this one has been set up to take on Bugatti's and Lambo's. It's a 950HP machine together with all wheel drive goodness!!
ME: I said "Look, I'll still run you - just cause I want to see this thing go... But you gotta let me go for a ride with you when this is all over..."
DR. G: Let's forget the race then and we'll just go for a quick ride.
--yeah "quick ride" might have been the understatement of the new millennium--
ME: Sweet!
WIFE: You two go have fun together.. I'll follow along in the Mustang.
DR. G: Get in, there's room for all of us.
WIFE: I don't know.. we're not gonna die are we?
DR. G: (Laughs maniacally)
ME: C'mon, it will be fun!!
Chapter 5 - The Ride Of My Life:
We set out on a road leading out of town. Where we get to a nice rural stretch that's when Dr. G finally opened the GTR up!... Those turbo's spooled and then "WHOA SHIT WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!" It honestly felt like on Star Wars when they go to light speed and there's that pause where all the stars stretch out and then "POW" and you're gone!!
I swear to God I felt like I had been shot from a gun!! I have never in my entire life experienced that kind of acceleration before - Not in my car, Not in a ZR-1, Not in a FR-500S Mustang (race car), Not on a roller-coaster, Not when I did the Richard Petty driving experience, Not even on a Boeing 747 on takeoff!
I have NEVER felt anything like this before.. I could literally feel my cheeks being pulled back against my face - and this was from a rolling start doing about 30! My wife covered her face and let out a scream that would raise the dead!! And the good Dr. just laughed!!
We repeated this exercise a couple of times - took a few curves - I found myself laughing out loud and clapping my hands like an infant child does when it get's excited!! WHAT A RUSH!!!
After a few "pulls" we pulled off the side of the road and then Dr. G explained how this car can hold 4 different tunes that can be switched on the fly. All you have to do is put it in park with the engine running,.. select the next tune, and go. That just impressed the hell out of me.... The "mild" street tune is 675HP all the way up to "Kill Mode" which is 950HP.
So Dr. G loaded up the 3rd tune which is good for about 800HP and we went from a dig... Now I'm not sure what it takes to break 315 drag radials loose on an AWD car with 285's up front... but we did it.. if only for a split second. If the 1st tune was like the jump to light speed,... well with the 3rd tune - we went PLAID! (a little Spaceballs reference for you youngsters ). More laughs more screams, more good times!!... Whew what a ride!
Chapter 6 - Let Me Drive Harry, I Won't Make A Fool Out Of You..:
So after this bit of mayhem Dr. G pulls the GTR over and puts her back to the "street" tune.. yeah 675HP is "street"... he looks at me and says, "You want to drive it?!" I said "Um....YEAH!"
So here I find myself in the driver's seat....behind the wheel of the hottest thing to ever leave the shores of Japan....with another $25K of engine mods poured in... What's a red-blooded American boy to do?!! Hell no I didn't puss out! I drove that car like I stole it!! And it was AM-AZ-ING!!
It's one thing to ride shotgun in a bona-fide super-car.. It's another to get to drive one! This thing for all the power and sheer Death it is packing felt so composed - other than the pull of the G-forces to remind you, you would never believe you were driving nearly 700HP... It launches straight, is just squats and goes.. It is all grip and no slip.. it feels planted and connected to the road... Nothing like my stick-axle Franken-Stang with it's lowly 500HP. I mean WOW.. Pure driving Zen!
I loved the paddle shifters! Talk about feeling like you're driving a Formula 1 car. Each shift was crisp, precise, and done under full power without ever lifting my foot off the gas. Downshifts were just as cool. It rev matches better than I can heel-toe! I had been skeptical of this part when reading about the car in articles, but boy oh boy does it all combine to inspire confidence in the corners.. I didn't push it in the corners nearly as hard as I would on a track or if it were my own car, but I could feel the car communicating the road to me and if I had to describe it in one word, that word would be "planted".
Chapter 7 - All Good Things:
We couldn't keep doing this forever so after a nice little run down some rural straights and back-road twisties I switched out with Dr. G and we went back to town.. I told him what a blast that was and I say with all truthfulness I have never experienced anything like that out of a car in my life. I was trembling with pure adrenaline-induced euphoria.
Who knows if I'll ever get another chance like that in my life time - Needless to say I've been officially infected with Import Fever!.. Although, getting back into my Mustang to drive home.. I just couldn't help but hang the ass-end out around a corner or two just to scare my wife one more time and remind myself that I've got a pretty damn fun ride too! :thumbsup:
Epilogue:
Text Message from Dr. G...
1/3
"Hey, sorry I missed your guys message yesterday. Glad you enjoyed it. See what I mean, I never end up racing anybody, just taking everyone for rides! Yes, they are quite addictive. I passed a Z06 Vette after catching him on the ramp to the Interstate. He tried to out accelerate me up the ramp. I was pulling right past him and changing lanes to the inside. The look on his wife's face was priceless!"
2/3
"We can get together, you can drive it again!"
3/3
"It is totally made to be enjoyed!"
...Haha!! Looks like I may get to ride those 675 ponies again!
Either read it or don't.
Prelude:
All of my life I have gravitated toward American Muscle. I currently own a 2008 Mustang GT/CS that over the years I have done a little bit here and a little bit there to. It's received a supercharger, fuel system, intake, exhaust, gears, and suspension upgrades. It's at a point now where it's a pretty stout machine pushing out 520-ish horsepower. It does not fear Shelby's or SRT-8's or SS's or Z-06's but everything has its limits and here is where the story begins...
Chapter 1 - How It All Began:
My wife is a registered nurse. She works in the ER at our local hospital. Currently she is enrolled in a Nurse Practitioner program with about a year left to go. For those that don't know, a Nurse Practitioner is like a hybrid Nurse/Physician kind or thing. Because the Docs see that she is going through the NP program, she's gotten in good with some of them at work. A few of them have taken her under their proverbial wings as it were... Which basically makes here one of the "inner circle". Why is it important?... Stay tuned...
Chapter 2 - Career Opportunities:
Doctors - especially ER doctors who have invested wisely over the years and have lots of money - love their toys... expensive toys.... GTR-type-toys... So one day at work a certain Doc that my wife is in good with comes in talking about his new car he just bought. We'll refer to him as "Dr. G" to protect the innocent. "Dr. G" is talking about how he has a new car and it's "pretty fast".. well... My wife - who is as proud of our Mustang as I am - starts in about how we need to race and there's no way Dr. G's car could take ours....
Keep in mind my wife has no idea about cars other than they have 4 wheels and use gas... so a GTR to her might as well be a Nissan Sentra... So now the stage is set...
Chapter 3 - Someone Set Us Up The Bomb!:
I'm at home perfecting my latest mash getting ready to brew when my wife calls from work all proud of herself to tell me about a race she has gotten all set up.
ME: O-rly?
HER: Yeah um it's with a Doctor I work with.. he's want to race your Mustang.. He's got a GT.. something (she turns away from the phone and I hear mumbling in the background).. He says it's a GTR
ME: silence...
HER: Hello?
ME: He's got a "What?"
HER: A GTR (mumbles in background..."is that right") Yeah, a GTR.
ME: Nope... Not interested... sorry honey, that thing is made to go against all-wheel-drive Lambo's.. Not Hot-Rodded Mustangs... Not even on my best day..
So I go back to brewing and I think to myself - "Yeah, but it sure would be cool to see that thing run..." Hey,.. It's like a Unicorn.. people claim they exist and they're magical, but no one has ever seen one before in the wild...
So I text her back and say I'm in... I know it's gonna hurt my pride but I have to know what a GTR is really all about...
Chapter 4 - D-DAY:
Everything is set and "Dr. G" brings in his GTR to work... I spend the day swapping out supercharger pulleys to my 8PSI, loading my race tune, and swapping out tires and rims. When his shift ends (Sunday morning). It's on...
Sunday morning arrives and my wife and I hop into the Stang and roll on down to the hospital.. We pull in the back parking lot and there it sits - under a car cover... I can tell by the shape what's under there.. We go inside and Dr. G is just finishing up some paperwork and we all walk out together. I help with the car cover and there it is in jet black.... A Unicorn with a big red "R" on the nose staring back at me...
I take a while to check out the car.. It's got Brembo's all around (6 pots up front and 4 in the rear). Two piece cross-drilled rotors - the rears are as big as my fronts! He's got it wrapped in Nitto INVO's up front and 555r drag radials in the rear. Out of the back are four, count-em, 4 - 4inch exhaust tips turned blue from the heat. Around front under the hood sits the 6-cyl mill with 4" dia plumbing gone everywhere and a giant pair of HKS blow off valves for the twin snails sitting underneath.
Dr. G proceeds to tell me about the car and how he bought it from the previous owner who at 400miles had the engine pulled and sent off to AMS for a complete rebuild.. It becomes obvious that this is not just any GTR - this is a built GTR with about $25,000.00 of engine work poured into it... To make a long story sort, this one has been set up to take on Bugatti's and Lambo's. It's a 950HP machine together with all wheel drive goodness!!
ME: I said "Look, I'll still run you - just cause I want to see this thing go... But you gotta let me go for a ride with you when this is all over..."
DR. G: Let's forget the race then and we'll just go for a quick ride.
--yeah "quick ride" might have been the understatement of the new millennium--
ME: Sweet!
WIFE: You two go have fun together.. I'll follow along in the Mustang.
DR. G: Get in, there's room for all of us.
WIFE: I don't know.. we're not gonna die are we?
DR. G: (Laughs maniacally)
ME: C'mon, it will be fun!!
Chapter 5 - The Ride Of My Life:
We set out on a road leading out of town. Where we get to a nice rural stretch that's when Dr. G finally opened the GTR up!... Those turbo's spooled and then "WHOA SHIT WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!" It honestly felt like on Star Wars when they go to light speed and there's that pause where all the stars stretch out and then "POW" and you're gone!!
I swear to God I felt like I had been shot from a gun!! I have never in my entire life experienced that kind of acceleration before - Not in my car, Not in a ZR-1, Not in a FR-500S Mustang (race car), Not on a roller-coaster, Not when I did the Richard Petty driving experience, Not even on a Boeing 747 on takeoff!
I have NEVER felt anything like this before.. I could literally feel my cheeks being pulled back against my face - and this was from a rolling start doing about 30! My wife covered her face and let out a scream that would raise the dead!! And the good Dr. just laughed!!
We repeated this exercise a couple of times - took a few curves - I found myself laughing out loud and clapping my hands like an infant child does when it get's excited!! WHAT A RUSH!!!
After a few "pulls" we pulled off the side of the road and then Dr. G explained how this car can hold 4 different tunes that can be switched on the fly. All you have to do is put it in park with the engine running,.. select the next tune, and go. That just impressed the hell out of me.... The "mild" street tune is 675HP all the way up to "Kill Mode" which is 950HP.
So Dr. G loaded up the 3rd tune which is good for about 800HP and we went from a dig... Now I'm not sure what it takes to break 315 drag radials loose on an AWD car with 285's up front... but we did it.. if only for a split second. If the 1st tune was like the jump to light speed,... well with the 3rd tune - we went PLAID! (a little Spaceballs reference for you youngsters
). More laughs more screams, more good times!!... Whew what a ride!Chapter 6 - Let Me Drive Harry, I Won't Make A Fool Out Of You..:
So after this bit of mayhem Dr. G pulls the GTR over and puts her back to the "street" tune.. yeah 675HP is "street"... he looks at me and says, "You want to drive it?!" I said "Um....YEAH!"
So here I find myself in the driver's seat....behind the wheel of the hottest thing to ever leave the shores of Japan....with another $25K of engine mods poured in... What's a red-blooded American boy to do?!! Hell no I didn't puss out! I drove that car like I stole it!! And it was AM-AZ-ING!!
It's one thing to ride shotgun in a bona-fide super-car.. It's another to get to drive one! This thing for all the power and sheer Death it is packing felt so composed - other than the pull of the G-forces to remind you, you would never believe you were driving nearly 700HP... It launches straight, is just squats and goes.. It is all grip and no slip.. it feels planted and connected to the road... Nothing like my stick-axle Franken-Stang with it's lowly 500HP. I mean WOW.. Pure driving Zen!
I loved the paddle shifters! Talk about feeling like you're driving a Formula 1 car. Each shift was crisp, precise, and done under full power without ever lifting my foot off the gas. Downshifts were just as cool. It rev matches better than I can heel-toe! I had been skeptical of this part when reading about the car in articles, but boy oh boy does it all combine to inspire confidence in the corners.. I didn't push it in the corners nearly as hard as I would on a track or if it were my own car, but I could feel the car communicating the road to me and if I had to describe it in one word, that word would be "planted".
Chapter 7 - All Good Things:
We couldn't keep doing this forever so after a nice little run down some rural straights and back-road twisties I switched out with Dr. G and we went back to town.. I told him what a blast that was and I say with all truthfulness I have never experienced anything like that out of a car in my life. I was trembling with pure adrenaline-induced euphoria.
Who knows if I'll ever get another chance like that in my life time - Needless to say I've been officially infected with Import Fever!.. Although, getting back into my Mustang to drive home.. I just couldn't help but hang the ass-end out around a corner or two just to scare my wife one more time and remind myself that I've got a pretty damn fun ride too! :thumbsup:
Epilogue:
Text Message from Dr. G...
1/3
"Hey, sorry I missed your guys message yesterday. Glad you enjoyed it. See what I mean, I never end up racing anybody, just taking everyone for rides! Yes, they are quite addictive. I passed a Z06 Vette after catching him on the ramp to the Interstate. He tried to out accelerate me up the ramp. I was pulling right past him and changing lanes to the inside. The look on his wife's face was priceless!"
2/3
"We can get together, you can drive it again!"
3/3
"It is totally made to be enjoyed!"
...Haha!! Looks like I may get to ride those 675 ponies again!
Last edited:
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