► Ford prices GT against Aventador
► Just 250 GTs built each year
► Ford Performance streamlines badges
Ford is back in the sports car market with a bang – with two new Blue Oval performance heroes on show at the 2015 Geneva motor show.
Officials confirmed to CAR that the GT supercar, seen first at Detroit and making its European debut in Switzerland this week, would be priced against the Lamborghini Aventador. This suggests a price point of around £250,000.
That’s considerably more than the last GT cost (around $140,000 in the US, or £90k), but competitive for a carbonfibre-bodied supercar crafted from the further reaches of the periodic table.
Ford GT: the sales plan
The GT will be supply-restricted and senior execs have revealed that only 250 would be made a year, with first deliveries in summer 2016. So it’ll be a rare beast; Ford built some 4000 of the 2005 GT supercar.
It might not have escaped your attention that June 2016 plays host to the Le Mans 24hrs – making it 50 years since Ford pulled off the memorable 1-2-3 at La Sarthe. We’d be mighty surprised if it didn’t compete there again to mark the anniversary…
Remember the GT remains a prototype supercar, for now. Execs have told CAR that it’s ‘95%’ of the finished product, so expect some minor tweaks before production. That’s why we haven’t yet heard exact specs, rather than ‘600bhp+’ claims for its turbocharged V6 Ecoboost engine.
Ford GT, Focus RS… a new global approach to fast Fords
The second car making its premier in Geneva is the third-generation Focus RS. Click here for the full story on the fast Focus, including its innovative Drift mode letting it slide like a rear-driver not a 4wd super-hatch. Fittingly, oversteer merchant Ken Block was on hand to drive it on to the stage, albeit very gingerly.
Ford has traditionally waited until late in a model’s lifecycle before adding ST and RS performance models, but Dave Pericak, director of Ford Performance, confirmed to CAR that this lead time would be slashed to around a year into a model’s life. Which has to be good news for enthusiasts.
And the company will streamline fast Ford badges, so there’s a more global approach – rather than the US going down one naming convention while Europe does things differently. Hence the Focus RS is now a worldwide model. Expect an announcement over which names bite the dust in the coming months.