Shelby unleashes 750bhp Mustang Super Snake

If you're going to christen your car with a name as ballsy as ‘Super Snake', you'd better be packing some pretty serious punch.

Just as well, then, that Shelby's latest tuning effort for the new Mustang is, by our reckoning, the most powerful version of Ford's latest pony car yet.

As standard, Shelby's Super Snake is treated to a Ford Performance supercharger-equipped SS, helping that 5.0-litre V8 kick out 650 all-American horsepower. But you can even tune the tuned version.

Spec the optional Kenne Bell or Whipple blowers, and power surges north of 750bhp. Yup, the new Shelby Super Snake outpunches the Mustang RTR and Hennessey's initial salvo in the 2015 ‘Stang power wars. It's as pokey as a Lamborghini Aventador SV, for chrissakes.

Seven-hundred-and-fifty horsepower. Through two rear Michelin Pilot Super Sport tyres. This, we confidently predict, will lead to much smoke. Good job the new Mustang's finally got independent rear suspension...

In fact, the Super Snake is a lot more sophisticated than that. Shelby hasn't just upped boost and hoped the rest of the car won't shake itself to pieces - there are beefier halfshafts, lower, stiffened suspension, and a bespoke set of gear ratios.

The engine breathes out via a lightweight Borla exhaust, and long gone are the days of pony cars depending on drum brakes for buttock-clenching stopping power. The Super Snake boasts upgraded six-piston brakes by American outfit Wilwood. Twenty-inch rims by Weld Racing just about fit over the top.

There's a healthy array of options to sift through too. Want more relentless stopping power? Have an extra brake duct pack, sir, and Wilwood stoppers on the rear too. Racing seats and harnesses, a diff and gearbox cooler and adjustable rear arms are all available.

It's also the first Super Snake to offer an automatic gearbox, though it's still a six-speed manual as standard. A mighty tough one, we expect.

Oh, and one more thing. That rather tasty bodykit, featuring the full suite of aerodynamic addenda, is almost all carbon fibre. A good ol' boys garage tuner job, this is very much not.

A rare one too: just 300 Super Snakes will be built per year.

And the cost? Well, it's $49,995 (£30,000)... on top of the cost of a regular Ford Mustang GT.

We've checked with Ford's UK arm, and though we Brits are at last getting a right-hand drive Mustang, there are no plans to offer the Shelby Super Snake package in Blighty.

Or anything faster than the regular 418bhp V8, in fact. Boo.

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