mustang
The rental car is a red 2002 Convertible Mustang I was expecting speedy acceleration and lots of power, but it doesn’t feel any faster than my Maxima. It has a 3.8 liter V-6 with 190HP but I’m not too impressed. Having the top down is still fun and provides a great way to see the buildings in downtown Chicago. Lots of people look at us as we go by, probably because we’re the only convertible in the area with the top down. Then again, maybe they’re checking me out. If it’s the former, who cares if it’s 50 degrees out. I just turn the heat on full blast and carpe diem. Of course, carpe diem applies in the latter case as well.
The V6 Mustangs are notoriously slow. They’re 200 lbs heaver than your Maxima, but have the same number of horses. My car, by comparison, weighs about 1000 lbs less than the Mustang. Here’s a bunch of weight/power ratios, just for fun.
lb/Hp (lower is faster):
’02 Ferrari 360 – 8.0
’02 Mustang GT – 13.0
’97 Maxima – 15.8
’01 Miata – 16.8
’02 Mustang – 16.9
’92 Miata – 21.6
’97 Geo Metro – 33.3
How did you manage to get a convertible Mustang as your rental car, anyway? I was always stuck in crap cars.
The key is the Hertz Gold Card that Matt had. They offered to upgrade us for $7 and we figured for less than $1/day, why not.