The range-topping pony car will apparently arrive as a model year 2026 car.
A post shared to the Mustang7G forum appears to confirm that the S650 Shelby GT500 will debut in 2025 for the 2026 model year. Just last week, Ford Authority claimed the all-new S650 Mustang would spawn a GT500 much earlier than in the S550's life cycle and in a body style that has been missing for some time, with the range-topper tipped to arrive in both coupe and convertible forms. That report claimed that the GT500 would launch in 2025 for the 2026 model year, and a plaque displayed in the Mustang Owner's Museum, alongside clay prototypes of the Mustang GT, has now pretty much confirmed this.
The wording on this plaque is somewhat ambiguous, calling attention to the discontinuation of the S550 GT500 (which occurred in September 2022) before saying that the model is "expected to make a comeback in 2025 for 2026."
On the one hand, we could look at that relatively vague wording and assume that this plaque is based on guesswork. But on the other hand, the enthusiast-run Mustang Owner's Museum clearly has a good relationship with Ford, having been featured on the Ford Performance website. Not any old museum gets direct access to clay models from the manufacturer either, which suggests that this information may have been provided by the Blue Oval when the replicas were delivered.
Ford itself has not yet confirmed that the S650 will indeed spawn a GT500 variant, but we can't imagine that the automaker would pass on the opportunity to squeeze just a little more juice from the pony car before it inevitably receives some form of electrification. But don't expect it to be cheap, whenever it may arrive. A fully loaded version of the S650 Mustang's current range-topper, the Dark Horse, costs more than the S550 GT500 did.
For all we know, the GT500 may not even make a comeback, as Ford CEO Jim Farley suggested in a tweet that a roadgoing version of the GT3 racecar may be under consideration. Perhaps that will be the new benchmark for a track-focused Mustang, but until Ford announces more about the S650, all we can do is wait and speculate.
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