28 LEFTOVER FORD GT RACECARS ARE ABOUT TO BECOME ROADGOING BEASTS
You're about to be able to buy a Ford GT racecar for the road. A high-performance car dealer and a company that transforms restomod Land Rover Defenders are planning to build a car that brings a Le Mans car from 2010 to the street.
It's called the Lynx GT1, and the pairing calls it "a unique, motorsport-inspired tribute to the 2010 Matech GT1 Le Mans race car." A car that, much like the GT it was based on, didn't live up to expectations but was incredibly cool anyway.
GT1 Will Have A Carbon Body And 1,200 Horses
The Lynx GT1 is a collaboration between Defender customizer and restomod company Lynx Motors and Graham Rahal Performance. GRP is owned by the Indycar driver of the same name. The Indiana dealer sells high-end exotics and runs a tuning and parts department to help create even more exotic cars. Neither shared much by way of details about their plans for the GT1, but here are the basics
The GT1 is an evolution of the 2005-2006 Ford GT, the retro-styled supercar that Ford launched in 2005 as part of its 100th birthday celebrations. The GT1 will have a carbon fiber body with aerodynamic enhancements borrowed from, or at least inspired by, the Ford GT that raced at Le Mans in 2010. The pictures show a wider body, an enormous rear wing, and a very deep front splitter among the highlights.
The plan for under the GT's rear hood is a supercharged V8 making more than 1,200 horsepower. The original car used a 5.4-liter supercharged V8 that produced 550 hp and 500 lb-ft of torque, and it's not clear what exactly will power this one.
Body Moulds Come Directly From The Racecar
The road to this car is longer than the original Mulsanne Straight, but it's a very interesting one. It starts with a racing team called Matech Concepts. The Swiss company was created to turn the 2005-2006 Ford GT into a sports car for FIA GT1 and GT3 competition.
Matech's GT1 car didn't race until 2009, long after production of the GT had ended. It raced at the 2010 24 Hours of Le Mans, where all three entries retired long before the end of the race. At least the last car to retire had been in front for eight hours when it gave up.
From there, it gets fuzzy, but Lynx acquired Matech's body molds and continuation chassis from a company called GT1. Michigan-based GT1 snagged 30 GT chassis and then put a 1,400-hp Roush-Yates engine in the back and intended to sell them under the GT1 name.
Evidently, GT1 only built two cars before selling them on because GRP and Lynx plan to build 28 copies of the Lynx GT1. This isn't the first project Lynx has tried with the GT chassis it has. Last May, it announced an electric version called the GT1e (as well as an unrelated DeLorean model). It's not clear what happened to that car, though some of the images have been reused for this GT1.
There's no word on pricing; info on the Lynx website seems to be a mix of this and an older project effort. But we can't imagine a car like this would give you much change from $2 million. After all, how many brand-new Ford GTs are there in 2025? Let alone ones with carbon bodies and more than double the factory power levels.