Everyone’s favorite GT (the Ford GT to the uninitiated) will have one final special-edition model before it’s put out to pasture. The 2022 Ford GT LM Edition, inspired by the red and blue livery of the 2016 Le Mans winner, honors Ford’s Le Mans victories and heritage.
Now, if you’re surprised that the Ford GT was still around, you’re not alone. Seems Ford has a habit of putting a model in hibernation after a few years, and so many other vehicles have taken the spotlight that it’s easy to forget that Ford currently makes a supercar.
“With innovative materials, design and engineering, the Ford GT is unlike any other production supercar,” says the global director of Ford Performance Motorsports, Mark Rushbrook. “As we close this chapter of the road-going Ford GT, the GT LM Edition gave us a chance to inject even more heart and soul from a podium-finishing racecar, furthering the tribute to our 2016 Le Mans win.”
Painted in Liquid Silver, the Ford GT LM allows customers to choose from exposed red or blue tinted carbon fiber highlights throughout the vehicle, including a matching driver’s seat. There also is a 3D titanium-printed dual exhaust with a unique cyclonic design inside the tips.
The interior uses contemporary Alcantara-wrapped carbon fiber seats with the aforementioned red or blue driver’s seat plus ebony passenger seat with stitching that matches the driver’s seat’s hue. The instrument panel is wrapped in Ebony leather and Alcantara, while the console, vent registers and lower A-pillars are carbon fiber with a matte finish.
Then, in a move that would excite no one but the most fervent Le Mans cognoscenti, the 3D-printed instrument panel badge is made from an alloy featuring the ground-up crankshaft from the third-place (No. 69) Le Mans winner from 2016. If Carroll Shelby is no longer autographing dashboards, why not this?
Of course, this being a Ford GT, it is powered by a 3.5-liter, 660-horsepower twin-turbo EcoBoost V6. Plenty of folks poo-poohed the lack of V8 when this generation of the GT appeared for the 2017 model year but, looking at the market today, this is no longer unusual.
In total, Ford will have produced nine special-edition GT street cars of this generation including:
- 2022 Ford GT Holman Moody Heritage Edition honoring Ford’s 1966 Le Mans 1-2-3 sweep and the team that engineered it; 21 built
- 2022 Ford GT Alan Mann Heritage Edition honoring the No. 16 Alan Mann Ford GT MK I lightweight experimental prototype that helped pave the way for the 1-2-3 sweep at the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans; 30 built
- 2022 Ford GT ’64 Prototype Heritage Edition honoring Ford GT’s roots and the earliest five original Ford GT prototypes; 27 built
- 2021 Ford GT ’66 Daytona Heritage Edition honoring the Ford GT MK II No. 98 race car that gave Ford a 1-2-3-5 domination at Daytona in 1966; 50 built
- 2020 Ford GT ’69 Gulf Livery Heritage Edition honoring the Ford GT40 MK I No. 6 race car that was victorious at Le Mans in 1969; 50 built
- 2019 Ford GT ’68 Gulf Livery Heritage Edition honoring Ford GT40 MK I No. 9 race car that was victorious at Le Mans in 1968; 50 built
- 2018 Ford GT ’67 Heritage Edition honoring Ford GT40 MK IV No. 1 race car that was victorious at Le Mans in 1967; 39 built
- 2017 Ford GT ’66 Heritage Edition honoring Ford GT40 MK II No. 2 that won at the 1966 Le Mans race; 27 built
Only 20 of the 2022 Ford GT LM Edition will be made. At the end of the model year, the GT will be discontinued.
Or go into hibernation, if Ford’s track record is any indication.
Source: www.classiccars.com