Images: Mustang6g

This video doesn’t show any action besides a few nice still shots, but it has some valuable information about the 2016 Shelby GT350 thanks to Jim Owens, the Shelby Brand Manager. Owens brought out a pre-production prototype for a few laps around the track at the Track Guys event at Texas World Speedway, and then he stopped to answer questions for a few enthusiasts. Thanks to Mustang6G.com, we have details of the 2016 Shelby GT350 while testing at Texas World Speedway.

The Shelby GT350 that is featured in the photos is Avalanche Gray, complete with a Tech Pack, complete with creature comforts such as heated and cooled seats, an 8.5-inch navigation screen, Sync III, big brakes, and the same horsepower output as the GT350 equipped with Track Pack, among other things. The car is also known as the TT, which stands for Technical Tool, a prototype for building the tooling before the production process even starts. Basically, it is a rough draft.

Owens also went on to answer a few questions that were asked by anxious enthusiasts and laid down some obvious hints of a few things. He made it clear that the SVT program is alive and well and isn’t going anywhere soon. It’s sitting under the Ford Racing umbrella. He also mentioned that the horsepower numbers for the Shelby are not just right above 500 ponies, but legitimately over 500 horses, and will indeed be hitting dealers this year sometime, likely in the fourth quarter. The model year wasn’t confirmed, but we still believe that it will be labeled as a 2016 model.

“It will continue to be a relative performance value. I’m not going to say it’s cheap, but if you think of all the stuff we’ve done—from the Focus SVT to the Contour to old Cobras to the Terminators—while they weren’t inexpensive, from a performance value standpoint, we will still have things in the car that you can’t get at any price.”

Owens said that prices on the packages will be near the same, and that picking the GT350 package of choice will be those who want a more track-oriented car with less or a car with all of the creature comforts.

“I would say it would be safe in saying it would be somewhere in between the Boss 302 and the GT500,” Jim said in the video. “I wouldn’t be surprised if the R was akin to the Boss 302 Laguna Seca, if I get my way.”