Kickin’ It Old School in the 2016 Ford Mustang GT California Special
A few months ago, Ford lent me a 2016 Mustang GT California Special to review. Its Monroney said it had automatic HID projector headlamps, LED tail lamps, SYNC 3, and knee-protecting airbags. Ford coated it in a color it calls Triple Yellow and added special badges and black mirror caps, hood vents, stripes, and other accents.
I didn’t see any of that when I looked at it. I saw the first Mustang I ever laid eyes on: the 1964 1/2 I went with my Detroit-metal-loving father to pick up when I was a boy. I saw the early ’70s Mustang a high school friend of mine and I tooled around in on our way to pretend we were college students for a night on the UT Austin campus. I saw West Coast buyers driving the original California Specials into their garages back in the late ’60s. I saw guys in old movies and TV shows taking their ladies out for burgers and shakes. A simple, good time – just what my tester’s combination of rear-wheel drive and six-speed manual transmission was. So I threw on my 501s and Chuck Taylors, and took my girl out for a couple of nice, old-fashioned dates.
Shakin’ Things Up
One Saturday afternoon, my gal and I set out for Big Top, a south Austin sweets shop equipped with a soda fountain. The rest of the city did, too. We felt lucky to find a parking spot within a mile of the building.
I haven’t needed a wingman for several months now, but the Mustang made me look good, anyway. It played it cool while I was inching backward and forward to parallel park. The clutch’s engagement point was well placed in the pedal’s travel. The clutch was also forgiving of small mistakes of the left foot that other cars wouldn’t tolerate.
Our strawberry milkshake didn’t come in a glass the way I had envisioned it would. My girl and I had to take it to go in order to meet my friends for dinner in time, so it was white styrofoam and two red straws for us. That didn’t make it any less sweet.
Going “HAM” on Some Burgers
I’ve had dinner at high-end steakhouses before. I’ve eaten caviar. I’ve tasted why people enjoy those things. You know what, though? There’s nothing like a good, classic burger every now and then. The Mustang may not be the fanciest car in the world, but that’s OK. Just as a good burger doesn’t need Kobe beef and fries don’t need truffle oil to taste good, the Mustang doesn’t need hand-selected hides and carbon-ceramic brakes to offer an enjoyable driving experience. My review vehicle had the basics, such as attractive styling, a strong V8 up front, and a cooperative stick behind that, but it also had extras, including heated and cooled Black Miko suede/leather front seats, voice-activated navigation, and a satisfyingly bass-rich 12-speaker Shaker Pro Audio System. No matter which drive mode I selected, the steering seemed heavy. I had no complaints. I love the feeling of nostalgia (even that for times I never lived through) that Mustangs inspire, so I enjoyed experiencing it through my hands, imagining I was behind the wheel of a Mustang from yesteryear, gently pushing and pulling the rim to aim the car where I wanted it to go.
It was all the more fitting that I drove with my girlfriend to Top Notch in north Austin. It’s a hamburger joint with curb service…that was also featured in “Dazed and Confused,” a movie full of classic American cars and trucks from back in the day. A table with my baby and two friends, a cheeseburger and fries, an ice-cold Coca-Cola, alright, alright, alright.
Down by the Lake
Some things just feel right. A tailored suit that’s a fabric second skin, sleeping in your own bed, expressing your thoughts and not saying what you think other people want to hear. Like other S550s, that’s how the Mustang California Special feels inside. Just. Right. The door sill is not too high or too far away from your left arm. The clutch pedal weight is well balanced. The hood is noticeable without being a hulking visual hindrance.
Things feel even more right if you do like I did and drive out to a lake near sunset with someone you love next to you and a picnic lunch in the trunk. The sonorous roar of the 5.0-liter V8 trails behind you through winding roads as you glide the shifter into its next gear with your significant other’s hand on top of yours, your smile mirroring theirs. I had never done that before that wonderful Sunday evening trip out to Lake LBJ, but it was somehow a familiar experience to me. I knew thousands of people in the past had done what I was doing. They had different hair, maybe another president, and someone else riding next to them, but they were headed to a green hillside in a Mustang. Feeling its power. Rowing through its gears. Listening to its exhaust. Smiling. Maybe even sipping on a milkshake, too.
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