Eye Candy Plus

Today's Feature Car

Ferarri "Daytona" 365 GTB/4 Coupe

The Ferarri 365 GTB/4 Daytona Coupe, produced from 1969 and into the early 1970's, was the world's fastest production road car at the time, officially clocking a top speed of 174 MPH.

The coupe version (GTB) was fairly successful in racing, with engine and chassis modifications, but was too heavy for anything but long-distance events such as the LeMans 24-hour race. In late 1974, a competition Daytona coupe was taken to Bonneville, where, driven by Luigi Chinetti Jr., Graham Hill, and Milt Minter, it set International Class C records at 10 miles (174.763 mph), 500 kilometers (171.255 mph), 500 miles (166.173 mph), and 1000 kilometers (166.445 mph). I participated in a magazine road test of Bill Harrah’s Daytona in 1979 and came home with a photo of the instrument panel with the speedometer reading 180 mph and the tachometer reading 7000 in fifth gear -- this from a box-stock Daytona running on Interstate 80 at 4500-foot elevation. The shift from fourth to fifth was made at 140 mph and gave a noticeable nudge to the backside.

The 4.4 liter, 6 Weber twin-choke carburetted V-12 engine with 24 valve DOHC heads made approximately 400 HP and revved to 8200 RPM. If you have never heard one of these Italian works of engineering art at full song, you don't know what you're missing. The car is just flat out sexy. So it's our Feature Car of the Day.



The timeless, venerable Shelby AC Cobra. Back in the early to mid 1960's, Carroll Shelby took the Brtish AC body and heavily beefed up the chassis, breaks, and suspension to handle the Ford 260, followed by the 289, and ultimately the mighty big-block 427 "Side Oiler" that made around 500 horsepower and developed about 500 lb./ft. of torque. With that much power and weighing just over 2,000 lbs, the big block cars had absolutely brutal acceleration, able to run the quarter mile well into the 10 second bracket and capable of top speeds well in excess of 160 MPH. The 289 small-block powered cars were not that much slower than their big block brothers and were actually more successful in road racing due to less weight over the front end. These cars were beasts to drive with no power steering or power brakes, but they handled and stopped fairly well even by today's standards, especially taking into account the primitive tire technology of the day.



The 2005 limited production Ford GT. Inspired by and almost identical to the GT-40 prototypes that won the 24 hours of Le Mans in 1966, -67, -68, and -69. Carroll Shelby was the one responsible for basically turning a floundering program into a winner, and this modern incarnation is a spectacular tribute to his genius.



This is a Holden Commodore R built by the Holden Racing Team for competition against the Ford Falcon in the Australian V8 SuperCar Championship, where it's Ford vs. Holden, a GM affiliate of sorts. They are purpose built replicas of their street counterparts; roughly the eqivalent of a Trans-Am Series road racer in the US. The engines are old style, electronically managed, fuel injected small blocks limited to 5.0 liters and 7500 RPM, making in the 600-650 HP range, running through a spec 6-speed gearbox to a watts link-type independent rear suspension. They hit 0-60 in just under 4 seconds and can hit 180 MPH on the top end (depending on the rear gear). They usually run 2 or 3 races per round at each track. It's fast and exciting and very popular with the Aussies and the Kiwis. I can't wait to go to my first race!