If you live in New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, or any other countries apart from the 19 Ford will be sending the GT to, then you can’t apply to order one. Yes, apply to order one.
The new GT is powered by a twin-turbo 3.5-litre EcoBoost V6 producing 600+hp/450kW+ and will be built on a carbon-fibre monocoque with a mixture of aluminium and carbon fibre body panels.
Ford will only be making 500 of the new GTs over the course of two years and so to help with the selection process Ford have set up an online application form for potential buyers to fill out.
In a sense it’s better than the Ferrari system of the most loyal and the wealthiest customers get first dibs. At least Ford are giving all its customers an equal playing field. Fair play to them for doing that. I guess that’s where the appeal of the GT lies – it’s the blue collar supercar.
However, it does seem odd that Ford will only be offering the GT in the USA, Canada, UK, Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Turkey, Ireland, Switzerland, Austria, Belgium, Sweden, Spain, Saudi Arabia, UAE, China, Macau, and the Philippines.
Someone at Ford clearly needs an atlas. I can understand why they might not want to offer it in Japan since Ford will be withdrawing from the Japanese market this year, but Australia and New Zealand seem to be an odd omission given the large fanbase for their cars down under.
The types of questions Ford asks about potential buyers are; if you’ve owned a Ford vehicle, if you’ve owned a GT, if you’re a collector, an “influencer of public opinion”, a motorsport enthusiast, or other.
They also ask if you’ve owned a GT and how often you use it. Whether or not it’s in a collection, or if you’ve taken it on to a track or events. I’m guessing they don’t just want to give these cars away to people who’ll lock them away in a climate controlled garage. I salute Ford for that.
If you haven’t owned a GT but have owned a “historically significant” Ford then you get the chance to tell Ford that too. Or if you have a close relationship with the company in some way, industry suppliers for example.
There’s also a section asking you to list three vehicle-related charitable activities/contribution you’ve made. Does picking up friends from the airport count as charity?
Car collectors also get a chance to show off their collections to impress Ford by listing some their most significant cars and whether or not the collections are public or private.
Good news if you’re a public influencer on social media; your Instagram followers and YouTube views may help you get a GT. Ford asks how your role as “public influence”, your key demographics, and a link to your site(s).
People with racing licenses can also let Ford know their license level, if they’ve competed in a motorsport event, and asks for a brief description of your “motorsports community activities”.
The final section asks about “your style”. Here, Ford wants you to provide a link to a video, photo, and/or document to help your case for GT ownership. Ford emphasise that it’s not a contest, rather a way to “learn more about your interest in the GT”.
Applications end on May 12, 2016. Once all that is done, and should you be one of the 500 lucky few, you’ll have to fork out around US$450,000 ($520,000) for your very own GT.
On a side note, Ford have put up an online configurator for us still dreaming of having a GT. That’s a good way to kill some time.
