The Original Shelby GT500 Super Snake: A One-Off Legend

Back in 1967, Carroll Shelby decided to see just how crazy he could make a Mustang. The result? A one-off monster that would become automotive legend—the original Shelby GT500 Super Snake.

This wasn't some carefully planned production run. It was pure madness wrapped in white paint with racing stripes, and only one was ever built.

When Shelby Got Creative

Ford had already given Shelby the keys to soup up their new pony car, resulting in the GT350 and GT500. But Shelby wasn't satisfied with "fast enough." He wanted to build something that would make people's jaws drop, and he got his chance through an unlikely partnership with Goodyear.

The tire company wanted to show off their new "Thunderbolt" economy tires (yeah, economy tires on a 500+ horsepower beast—go figure). Shelby saw an opportunity to go completely overboard.

Instead of the standard GT500's 428 cubic-inch engine, Shelby crammed in a smaller but far more potent 427 V8. This wasn't just any 427 though—it was built to the same specs as the engines in Ford's Le Mans-winning GT40s. Le Mans pistons, aluminum heads, forged crank—basically everything needed to run flat-out for hours without exploding.

The finished car pumped out 520 horsepower, which was absolutely bonkers for 1967.

The Legendary Test Drive

Once the Super Snake was done, Shelby's engineer Fred Goodell took it for what has to be one of the most epic test drives in automotive history. He drove the thing 500 miles, averaging 143 mph the entire time and hitting a top speed of 170 mph.

Remember, this was on those economy tires filled with nitrogen to keep them from melting. The whole thing sounds like something out of a fever dream, but it actually happened.

The Plan That Never Was

Shelby originally wanted to build 50 of these Super Snakes, but reality hit hard. The production costs were astronomical, and the selling price would've been insane even by today's standards. So the project got shelved, leaving just that single white car as proof that it ever existed.

That one car eventually sold at auction for $2.2 million—not bad for a tire company publicity stunt.

The Name Lives On

The Super Snake badge disappeared for four decades before Shelby brought it back in 2007 on the fifth-generation Mustang. This new version was based on the GT500 and cranked out 600 horsepower, or 725 hp with the warranty-voiding Kenna Bell kit.

The latest Super Snake pushes 830 horsepower and proves that Shelby still knows how to make ridiculous amounts of power. But there's something special about that original—the white car with racing stripes that started it all.

Bringing Back the Legend

In 2018, Shelby decided to honor the original by building ten "continuation" Super Snakes based on 1967 Mustangs. Each one cost nearly $250,000 and featured over 550 horsepower from a period-correct big-block V8.

It's a testament to how legendary that first Super Snake became. One car, built for a tire test, ended up spawning a whole lineage of Shelby monsters. Sometimes the best ideas come from the craziest circumstances.