Shelby Super Snake delivering power and joy

“It’s almost a race-car, without the bars,” John said.

John has had the car for five years, after it was shipped from the United States and converted to right-hand drive in Melbourne.

“Shelby in America build the cars, and then it comes to Mustang Super Sports in Melbourne, and they convert it from left to right-hand drive,” he said.

“From a new car it’s probably about 15 months until you get it, start to finish.”

While this is the ‘dream car’ for John, he said he didn’t drive it as much as he’d like to.

“We don’t drive it much, it’s mostly still a show car,” he said.

“It’s only done 11,500km, to get an idea of how much we drive it.

“Now we’re retired, we’ll probably drive it a little bit more, but I’ve done two grandkids’ weddings in this now.”

The race-car performance capabilities of the Super Snake aren’t lost on John, but the car is yet to go around a track.

“We’ve been over to Winton in it, but it hasn’t been on the track,” he said.

“You can pay so much money and they’ll do lap times for you.

“We will get around to it.”

The Super Snakes are specially-built cars, and, just like designer handbags, they come with a serial number of authenticity, displayed proudly by the gear-shift.

The powerful engine has the strength to carry you around a race track, and custom adjustments can be made along the life of the car.

“It comes out of Ford as a standard 4.5 litre engine, and when it goes to Shelby, they convert them, and supercharge them,” John said.

“Everything about it is like a race-car: the brake calipers, so they’ll have bigger brakes; I can change the suspension from sport to a light, to touring.

“It’s totally different from the Mustangs you can buy here.

“Even if you get a V8 5.4litre, there’s nowhere near the power that this has.

“If you ever saw Ford vs Ferrari — the Mustang won.”