Ford Mustang GTD Competition Claims New Nürburgring Lap Record

Taking Chevrolet off the top spot

Ford has went back to the Nürburgring swinging, and with a new variant of the GTD set a lap time of 6:40.835, smashing Chevrolets 6:49.275 by over 8 seconds, and lays claim to the fastest American production car on the ring.

To achieve this Ford have tinkered extensively with the original GTD to further the platforms potential. Ford haven’t given many specific details but they have said hat they have fettled with the engine to make more than the 815hp of the standard GTD (no figure quoted), reduced weight, improved the aerodynamics and put improved tyres on the car.

Ford’s diet for the GTD included swapping to magnesium wheels, carbon bucket seats and have refined the damper control system, and in terms of aerodynamics they have made changes to the rear wing, added new front canards and have mounted aero discs on the rear wheels to reduce drag.

Now the run completed is listed as a pre-production/prototype class run officially by the Nürburgring, however both the corvette ZR1 and ZR1X are also in the same class, simply because none of them are homologated for the German market, as required for production car runs, the biggest questions about the legitimacy of the runs are surrounding the availability of the Competition and the Tyres used.

Ford are re-opening the orderbooks for the GTD and have said the record setting Competition will have a serialized limited run, with exact figures yet to be released. There is also questioning around the vagueness of the tyre improvements, some speculating that they are using slicks or DOT approved semi-slick tyres, however there is no evidence to support this yet.

For now however, the ball is in Chevrolets court, and I don’t think they are going to take it lying down.