Out in Monterrey, California today, Ford board member Edsel Ford II, marketing chief Jim Farley and Shelby American president John Luft took the wraps off a one-off 2013 Shelby GT500 built as a tribute to the late Carroll Shelby. The car, built by “Friends of Carroll” has been dubbed the Shelby GT500 Cobra and is painted in the traditional Guardsman Blue with Wimbledon White stripes that graced many of the original Cobras of the 1960s.

It’s not the just the paint that sets this particular car apart from run-of-the-mill GT500s, that is if you can call a 662 hp Mustang run-of-the-mill! This car’s rear haunches are several inches wider than any standard Mustang that rolls out of the Flat Rock Assembly Plant.

Within those swollen wheel arches are 20-inch wheels that measure 10-inches wide in front and 13-inches wide at the back. Those back wheels are wrapped in 345-section rubber to help put the output of the engine to the road.

Speaking of the engine, the GT500’s already stout 5.8-liter V8 has had it’s normal 2.3-liter Eaton supercharger replaced with a 4.0-liter Whipple blower from the Ford Racing catalog.

The GT500 Cobra will be on display at the Ford pavilion at the Rolex Historics this weekend where the original Cobra is the featured marque this year. It will then go on tour throughout the fall before it gets put to an as yet undisclosed special purpose according to Jim Farley.

(more…)