Many lifestyle gurus stress the fact that the 'Journey is the Game' and not the destination. It's how well you get there that's more important than just fulfilling your dreams.
Most of us spend a lot of energy trying so hard to get to the top not realising that we fail to have fun in the process.
It takes a lot of energy and commitment to stay focused on career and business and have a fun-loving mentality throughout the process, but many great businesses such as Virgin and Apple and their leaders have shown us that this is possible.
Gregory Peck received many lifetime achievement awards a few years before he passed away. The awards were acknowledgements of his journey and not the destination. The destination is always a reward for your journey.
Coming to automobiles, car segments are usually formed after meeting a certain set of requirements. Its price segment, its target audience, its appeal and its sustainability in the market.
In the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s when rock music was at its best, there was a sort of image that the youth strived to achieve. And there was a certain car segment that appealed to them.
Besides the socio-economic factors, cars also develop a cult status over the years. The reasons could be its presence in movies or its popularity among famous people.
The 'King of cool' aka Steve McQueen is one such famous personality. Having carved a niche in the movie world with his anti-hero persona and brilliant performances in movies like The Towering Inferno and The Great Escape, he was once the most highly paid actor in the world in addition to being an avid car and bike racer.
Personalities such as McQueen attract cult-like followings through their charm and enthusiasm and it is no wonder that his hit-men chasing character 'Bullitt' (1968) created a huge fan base for one car in particular.
A car that has sustained its image over the years to this day for being aggressively styled, youth-oriented, powerful and affordable. The Ford Mustang!
It's exactly what it was always meant to be. A simple powerful car with a strong image. It lacks all the electronic domination found in modern cars.
It has a 4.4-litre V8 engine that delivers 300 hp. The manual transmission car that I had the pleasure of driving took 5.5 seconds to do the 0-100 km/h run with two persons in it.
Traction Control (TCS) is standard on the Mustang GT and is something this car cannot do without. A light body with a high powered rear axle is just what fishtailing requires. And this car fishtails easily without the traction control. The TCS when activated kicks in and prevents most skidding and oversteer conditions.
While not as effective as the Electronic Stability Program (ESP) found in most cars of this segment, it still does enough to let a responsible driver have a lot of fun!
Another interesting feature is the solid rear axle.
Most cars in this segment sport independent suspension, but they are more expensive to fit. The independent suspension feels a little bouncy at high speeds but not so much that a layman would notice. It's these things that make the Mustang a great car at affordable prices.
Sure they could price it three times what it is and load it with the latest gadgets and superior technical components, but that's not what this car is aiming for.
And that is precisely why such cars cannot be compared to rally-bred all-wheel drive cars with active centre differentials and yaw control designed to keep it stable when manoeuvring curves with speed levels well beyond border levels of insanity.
Sure the Mustang can match the 0 – 100 km/h time with most competitors, but it needs to be down straight roads. High speed curves are not this car's speciality.
This car loves straight roads and straight roads only! The manual transmission gear lever is placed perfectly and its short throw design makes it a real pleasure to use. The overall ergonomics of the interiors was good and the look is retro. Build quality of the interior materials could be better, but is acceptable given the price bracket.
The Mustang is easily upgradable and hence the large number of custom designs and performance modifications that we see around. The Mustang GT is also available with a convertible roof option as well as in Automatic Transmission.
Driving this car on the highway was a great experience. The solid rear axle did not affect passenger comfort at all. The cruising feel complemented by the exhaust tone was great, and this is probably something that rally bred cars are incapable of.
The tone of the exhaust was one of the main reasons why this car felt great. The engine comes to life with a sound that made you go 'Wow'! Each gear shift was accompanied by a slightly different yet loud tone and it makes you feel fast and powerful.
A luxury V8 with double the power wouldn't feel this good for the fact that the exhaust doesn't sound anything like the Mustang's. That's what differentiates muscle cars (also called pony cars) from the rest, and the Mustang invented this breed.
Slow speed cruising with the windows down gives the driver an immense sense of freedom and power. It's a feel that is independent of the car price and segment.
This feeling is something such cars were meant to create and the Mustang does it right !
Muscle cars with their large engines faced a lot of problems sustaining themselves in the market with increasing fuel prices and the period between the 1960s up to the late 1990s saw the rise and fall of many muscle cars from different manufacturers, all of which were derived and inspired by the Mustang, which however managed to sustain itself in the market and remained uninterrupted in production and is now in its fifth generation since its inception in 1964.
The higher powered Shelby Variations are also available called 'Shelby Cobra' which are high performance cars built by Ford. The latest is the Ford Shelby GT500KR (KR stands for king of the road) and is powered by a 540 hp 5.4-litre supercharged V-8 variation with a Ford Racing Power Upgrade Pack.
The KR is the supercar featured in the new Knight Rider television series. On the whole, this is a car with an image that has been sustained over decades.
It still has the road presence, retro looks and driving pleasure that the earlier Muscle cars had and people like Steve McQueen have made its image legendary.
It's a car that makes the journey more of a thing to look forward to than reaching the destination!
– Philip Shane is a Dubai-based motorhead
