Anyone who’s spent any time on this blog knows that when it comes to building cars, there’s no “last” anything! So, instead of claiming this is the last car I’m adding to my sportscar fleet-and being a liar again-I’ll claim it’s the “second to last” because, I know there’s going to be at least one more, because…
OMG! Another Mustang? Srsly?!
Yeah, I can hear it now: maybe I am overdoing a bit with the Mustangs, but, see, I really like them, OK? I bought this gold full-race Shelby GT350 several months ago, partly as a homage to my original “Honey Gold” street fastback in the Muscle Car fleet. After building it, though, I decided I didn’t much like it: it’s too dark and dull and just gets lost on the black track, so I disassembled it and put the body in the “sell pile,” planning to list it on ebay and give someone a bargain. As usual, though, I never got around to it (its funny how that works: I always find the time to buy cars, but somehow I’m always just too busy to sell them!)
A few posts back you found that I’ve decided to launch a whole new fleet of Trans Am racing cars, and thus am taking the 4 Trans Am cars that were in the sports car fleet out; I had 3 sports cars that were “spares/stand-ins” that thus rotated in to fill the gap left by the TA departure, but I needed one more, and this Shelby fit the bill, so it came back out of the “sell pile” and got a brand new chassis and a slightly used set of Road Race Replicas wheels and tires. This time around I dressed her up with a few adverts and decals, which add a little color. While its still far from the best looking car in the fleet, it runs pretty good: its not lightning fast, buts its stable, which is just as good, if not better sometimes. That also makes it different from the other 2 full race Shelby ‘stangs in the fleet, the maroon #35 and the yellow #70, both which are so fast its all I can do to keep them from flying off the track!
Now, I should note that, as a lifelong Matchbox collector, the #75 is just a little bit special, and those of you who also collect Matchbox cars will understand why! As a result, I felt this baby needed a nickname and a driver even before her first time trial, so she has been dubbed “The Minister”, and is driven by a young but ambitious upstart from Arkansas known as Billy “BLACK FUSE” Bodine.
This car’s downfall will be the dreaded odd number: adding it means I now have 5 Shelby ‘stangs in the fleet, disrupting my carefully cultivated “Tetragrammaton.” As a result, I feel sure this car’s tenure in the sportscar fleet will be brief, so if any of y’all are interested, she’ll probably be up for sale as a complete car soon! Keep watch on how she does in the tournaments to see if you want to add her to your fleet!
That is interesting about the differences in preformance, the stability of the one verses the lightening speed of the others. I would think that variety on the track would make for an interesting race. I don’t see anything wrong with the Mustang fleet, that you like them is more the reason enough to have as many as strike your fancy!