A typical rental car isn’t something to get excited about. Normally, you end up with a Nissan Altima with unidentifiable stains on the upholstery. But Shelby American has something different in mind. The legendary tuning company has developed a souped-up Ford Mustang for rental company Sixt. It arrives in rental fleets this summer.
Shelby has a long history of building high-performance rental cars. The Hertz “Rent-a-Racer” program debuted in the 1960s with black-and-gold GT350-H (“H” for “Hertz”) Mustangs. Shelby, Hertz, and Ford revived the concept in 2006 and 2016 with small batches of cars based on newer generations of Mustang. The Sixt GT-S Mustang is the first rental car built by Shelby for a company other than Hertz.
The GT-S is no ordinary Mustang. Shelby added a supercharger to the stock 5.0-liter V8, bumping output to “over 600 horsepower” (Shelby doesn’t get more specific than that). The engine exhales through a Borla cat-back exhaust system. The GT-S also gets Brembo brakes and Ford Performance springs and anti-roll bars. Rental cars will be available only with a 10-speed automatic transmission.
Just as the original Hertz rental cars were painted in the company’s black and gold colors, the GT-S Mustangs wear Sixt’s corporate colors or orange and black. Some cars will get orange paint with black stripes, while others will get the reverse of that color scheme. All cars get a Shelby body kit and wheels. Interiors get black and orange upholstery to match the exteriors.
These muscle cars will initially be available to rent in Southern California, Southern Florida, and Las Vegas, according to Autoblog. The first 20 cars will hit rental fleets this summer, with pricing to be announced closer to that time.
Cars will be put up for sale once they are retired from rental service. Rental cars are generally subjected to a lot of abuse, meaning they’re not ideal used-car buys, but these Shelby Mustangs could become future collectibles thanks to their limited numbers and unusual pedigree. But if you’re planning to buy, Shelby will sell you a Mustang GT today with up to 700 hp, while Ford is rolling out its own 700-hp Mustang: The GT500.
