Automatic Mustang No Longer Underrated on the Track
Nothing beats a fully manual Shelby Mustang—well nothing except a 10-speed automatic Mustang GT.
If you’re anything like us, you’ve been wondering how the new 2018 10-speed automatic Mustang GT performs against it’s predecessors. Let’s take it up a notch, though. How would it stack up against a GT350R in a drag race? We stumbled across a channel called Serpent Stangs (another great Mustang channel that we just had to subscribe to) that did precisely that.
Serpent Stangs is lucky enough to have access to both a brand new 2018 GT and a GT350R. Great minds think alike, and he wanted to see how they performed comparatively speaking. To find out, he brought both cars to Beech Bend Dragway in Bowling Green, Kentucky and dragged in both them one at a time.
Both Mustangs are running track-ready tires, but not drag radials. Both cars have stock engines and drivetrains. They’re pretty evenly matched.
The first pass is in the 2018 GT, and he got 12.17-seconds at 117 miles per hour. Not bad for its first trip down the strip. Keep in mind, that was with a 2.0 60-foot time, so there’s definitely room there to break into the 11-second range. Things weren’t so good for the GT350R’s first run of the day. Due to a launch control malfunction, it ran a 13.20. The second (and last) run was 12.23 at 118 miles per hour, and that was with proper functionality.
At this point, it’s clear that the 2018 GT is better at drag racing, but just how much better? Well, in drag mode, the 10R80 chirped tires in second through fifth gear, delivering a 12.0-second run at 118 miles per hour. It’s pretty clear that both cars would do better with a proper set of drag radials, but even so, it’s going to be hard for the GT350R to compete with the new 10-speed auto transmission in the GT at this rate.
Still, for general fun on the street and road course track days, we still think we’d have a bit more fun shifting our own gears in the GT350R, though.
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