Mustang Coupe

Make
Ford
Segment
Coupe

In January of this year, news broke of a new Ford Mustang GT3 racer. Then, Ford Performance released a singular image, which you can see below the embedded tweet. It showed what appears to be a Mustang with a wing fit for a race car. The factory-backed racer will enter competition in 2024 with IMSA. Now, we've heard the Ford racer for the first time, or at the very least, what is very likely the Ford Mustang GT3 race car. Ford teased the sound of the new car as part of the buildup to the official launch of the next-gen Mustang, which will debut on September 14 in Detroit.

The teaser is part of a larger campaign to build awareness around the upcoming new Mustang. Ford has previously teased a new Mustang GT and the street car's V8 exhaust noise on Twitter. But this race car sounds about a million times better than the street car ever could, and we believe it's the GT3 for a few reasons.

First, there's that exhaust note. Frankly, nothing gets that loud and that raw with modern catalytic converters on it. This is clearly a track-only car. Second, that gear whine noise. Again, no street car has a transmission that makes gear noises like that unless it's broken. Finally, and this is perhaps the most subtle element, we can hear echoing within the audio clip.

That tells us the audio for the vehicle in question was recorded in an empty and uninsulated space, like a race car without an interior. OEMs go to great lengths to prevent noises like that in street cars, but certainly not in any race cars. We should also note this tweet hasn't come from our usual source for Mustang teasers.

Previously, teasers for the new 'Stang were sent out from Ford's Twitter account. This one, however, came from Ford Performance, the brand's racing arm. You might recognize that name from a myriad of Ford motorsports projects; the new Supervan is a favorite of ours.

All of these factors tell us that this is likely a competition-spec Mustang. While we've clearly established this is no street car, we feel we ought to point out how fast those shifts appear to be banging out as well. Those upshifts and downshifts sound super fast, and the GT3 also has no ordinary gearbox but a rear-mounted transaxle.

The upcoming GT3 racer is a partnership between Ford and Multimatic and will still be powered by a Coyote V8. It's not clear how big the motor is, nor what kind of modifications the motor will use. For now, we're going to have to just listen and wait.