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2006 Ford GT Streches Its Legs on the Highway After a Tune, You Can Rent It

Eighteen years ago, the Blue Oval launched the Ford GT, which was the company's modern take on its iconic GT40. The American marque fitted it with a supercharged V8 motor that had a 5.4-liter displacement, and it was good for 550 horsepower in its day. It was enough to sprint from 0 to 60 mph (97 kph) time of just 3.5 seconds.
2006 Ford GT 6 photos
Photo: Screenshot from YouTube video by Auto Top NL
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In 2004, that value was more than impressive, especially from a brand that is more known for its mass-market propositions, not exotic cars. Ford built almost 4,000 units of the GT up until 2006, and the nameplate was then put on the sidelines for a decade, just in time to launch a successor that would celebrate the half-century that had passed since Ford's result at the 1966 LeMans race.

Now, in 2022, if you look at the figures promised by the 2006 Ford GT, you will still consider it worthy of being a supercar. After all, it is a rear-mid-engined exotic vehicle that was made in limited numbers, and it came with more than enough power in its day, while performance was also impressive during its time.

The owners of this example, a 2006 Ford GT, have applied a stage 1 tuning kit from an unspecified tuner. The result is claimed to take the V8 from 558 metric horsepower to 600 metric horsepower, according to the tuners, while the increase in peak torque is not specified. The latter could not have stayed the same as stock, but the final value is not mentioned.

Usually, when someone announces that they have a stage 1 tune on their car but does not have any figures for torque, it may mean that the ECU was rewritten without a dyno, and that the tune was tested on public roads to ensure that it operated accordingly. As you can imagine, the situation described is not ideal, but that has not stopped people from doing it anyway.

Experienced tuners may not approve of these methods, which are far from the usual practice of doing rolling-road tests and incrementally raising the power of a vehicle without risking the safety of anyone on the road, while also having the ability to precisely monitor sensors while benefitting from optimal cooling.

This particular Ford GT lives its days in The Netherlands as a rental car, and people can walk away with the keys for EUR 1,000 per hour with a strict mileage limit or EUR 5,000 per day.

A deposit of EUR 5,000 is mandatory for those interested in driving it alone, but a customer could also have an employee of the rental company accompany them if they are looking for a shorter rental period and at a smaller fee. If you ever decide to rent an exotic vehicle, be sure to read the contract first.

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About the author: Sebastian Toma
Sebastian Toma profile photo

Sebastian's love for cars began at a young age. Little did he know that a career would emerge from this passion (and that it would not, sadly, involve being a professional racecar driver). In over fourteen years, he got behind the wheel of several hundred vehicles and in the offices of the most important car publications in his homeland.
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