2018 Mustang GT aka Project Goldmember

By 2018, the Mustang game had evolved, and so had we. Enter Project Goldmember, our 2018 Mustang GT. This was the first year of the updated S550 generation with Direct Injection and the new 10R80 10-speed automatic, and we were itching to see what it could do. Why “Goldmember”? Let’s just say this car’s personality was as bold as a gold bullion (and maybe we’re big Austin Powers fans – “I love gooold!”). Painted in a flashy hue and built to hustle, Goldmember was all about blending daily-driver comfort with pure track ferocity. In fact, Jared liked to joke it was his 9-second grocery getter – emphasis on “getter,” because this thing got it done at the drag strip

Out of the box, our 2018 GT made a respectable ~430 whp stock, but that was merely a starting point. We threw on a Whipple Gen 5 3.0L supercharger and a corn-fed Lund Racing tune (E85, of course) and watched the power skyrocket. With basic boost and bolt-ons, Goldmember went deep into the 10s, then cracked into the 9s – 9.79 @ 144 mph was Jared’s first 9-second run in the car. But we knew there was far more in it. Over 2019, we kept refining this build: adding a 10-rib supercharger pulley setup for more boost (up to ~18 psi), upgrading fuel with ID1300x injectors and our triple-pump fuel system, and beefing up the drivetrain (gears, a Circle D torque converter, clutches, carbon fiber driveshaft – you name it, we did it). Every tweak brought more speed. Goldmember quickly progressed from 9.7s to low 9s, and by late 2019 we were tantalizingly close to the 8s.

In January 2020, on a cool Florida evening, it finally happened – Goldie blasted an 8.64 @ 157 mph quarter-mile, with a brutal 1.27-second 60’ launch off the line. This 2018 GT, full-weight and still rocking A/C and leather, became an 8-second street car. To say it surprised a few supercar owners at the track would be an understatement! Goldmember’s mod list was encyclopedic and uncompromising: Whipple supercharger, built trans, full return fuel system, drag suspension, sticky tires – the works. The result was a car that could drive to the grocery store (in theory at least) and then rip off a single-digit ET before you could say “shaken, not stirred.”