May 19: Ford's pride and joy is Canadian!

Beautiful car. Fast (200+ mph), gorgeous (just look at it), expensive ($400K) and Canadian. This is Ford's new pride and joy, the GT. Built to raise Ford's sporting cred on the street and also on the track. A place where the original GT40 of the mid '60's distinguished itself by winning at LeMans and making it an all GT40 podium in 1966. Not bad for an upstart.

Now just called the "GT", this one will be out shortly and will be available to a select few. How select? You have to submit your resume to Ford. Well, not quite, but you have to prove to Ford that, you will be a worthy owner, so a little begging would be a nice touch. Buying it to drive it, not to store it, until the price goes even higher. Shame on you for even thinking about doing such a thing.

But what is really cool is this.........

Just a building, you say? Absolutely correct, but behind these walls in a suburb of Toronto, lies the sole assembly line for the impressive GT. Ever hear of Multimatic? Probably not, unless you are a car person, then you'll know that they have been racing Fords for years, as well as supplying production parts to many of the big car manufacturers. Multimatic has plants in the US, Europe and Asia. And most people have never heard of them.

Did you know that they were the brains behind the very exclusive Aston Martin One 77?

The entire One 77 production was exactly seventy seven (77). Exclusive, but all one needed was over $1m and a friend at Aston Martin. Multimatic also raced an Aston for a while throughout North America.

And the Canadian driver, who drove the Multimatic Aston Martin, also did much of the on track testing for the new GT. That driver is a LeMans winner, as well as a series champion, where he and his co-driver race a Mustang GT350 (of which he also did developmental work for Ford). Who is this lucky guy?

The one on the right in this pic, taken at Daytona, USA, is Scott Maxwell. Obviously very talented and equally obvious, very well respected. My brush with greatness? He works out at the same university gym in Toronto that I do. Before you ask, no I can't get you a new GT thru Scott. I know him well enough to congratulate him on his latest win or to ask him how the testing is going (he's now sorting out the GT's street version).

So, back to Multimatic. A company not really well know among the general public, and one in Canada to boot, will be tasked with building Ford's long anticipated supercar. This says a lot about the company. Kind of funny, though that an iconic American car, will be built in the Toronto area. So this......... 

......will become this.........

......practically in my backyard. And, it also will have been set up to race and drive by one of my workout buddies. 

We, as Canadians, are always looking for things that say, "Hey, look at us! Look at what we've done or at what we can do." Must be something about living in the shadow of the big, ol' United States of America (kind of like I feel about my older brother and me).

Congratulations, Multimatic and to Scott. Way to go, Canucks!

Until next time......