It’s full-noise immersion into Americarna rah-rah when on the look out for a special relation to today’s test car.

Price: $97,990 (all are sold).

Powertrain: 5.0-litre normally-aspirated V8, 345kW/ 556Nm, six-speed manual, rear wheel drive, claimed economy 13.9 L/100km (15.4 on test), emissions 320g/100 CO2.

Vital statistics: 4784mm long, 2080mm wide, 1381mm high, wheelbase 2720mm.

Safety: Three star ANCAP.

We like: Heritage muscle look, excellent handling, the soundtrack … and it’s a Mach 1.

Not so much: Ride can become firm, cosy in the back, manual gearchange is a workout.

SOMETHING special is happening when towns close to allow hundreds of high-powered American cars to pack their streets.

For almost a week of every February, Taranaki transforms into a little slice of the USA.

Americarna, the brainchild of New Plymouth businessman John Rae, is a celebration of American motoring culture that first rumbled its way around the region's highways in 2007 and has continued to grow ever since, restoring in full stars ‘n stripes glory this year after a phase of Covid disruption.

On February 22-25 up to 1000 high-powered American vehicles of all ages and kinds took a tour. The coastal town of Opunake offered up its beach. South Taranaki’s main town, Hawera, staged Acceleration Event, allowing the big horses to cut loose. In North Taranaki, Waitara’s main street closed for a lunchtime display. Inglewood shut down for a late afternoon street party.

New Plymouth’s central business district also closes for the big show, Friday Night Street Cruise, traditionally attended by thousand then the next day for Americarnival – live music, children’s activities, stalls, and all the entered cars on static display.

Americarna is fantastic and colourful. And perhaps a bit controversial. Of course it prompts letters to the local newspaper from people thundering on about fossil fuels and climate change. It also injects an estimated $4 million into the local economy. And for tens of thousands, it is a fun time.

Mine came from laying hands on a rare latest-model Ford Mustang, the Mach 1, a special Ford NZ brought in a year ago. Our run would steer clear of full immersion into the big show – that’s a $500 cost and, anyway, the field was fully subscribed. The plan, instead was to follow the Americarna fleet in a 2022 Mach 1, keeping a look out for the first of this car’s kind.

It was hardly an undercover assignment. The latest Mach 1 is patently a star attraction in its own right. Just 50 were imported by Ford New Zealand and all immediately sold to waiting enthusiasts. Save the one held by Ford NZ’s marketing and press department. Which, incidentally, is the only example of the latest breed to make this celebration. Guessing all the others are being stored as appreciating assets in temperature-controlled garages.

Fighter Jet Grey is an exclusive hue, highlighted with matte black and orange stripes down the flanks and across the bonnet. Orange brake calipers. It’s a real looker. The interior is spectacular, too. And the big fastback is a manual, so gets a white pool ball gearshift knob.

While we’re talking about spectacular, let’s look at this Mustang’s performance potential.

The 5.0-litre V8 gains the larger, 87mm throttle body and intake system from the GT350; also shared when is the Tremec TR-3160 manual. Stiffer sway bars and front springs incorporated; it gets the GT350’s front subframe. The rear section mounts on stiffer bushes and uses GT500 rear toe links. Retuned steering and revised MagneRide adaptive dampers also implement. Because it’s designed for track work, there’s a rear axle cooler and an added engine oil cooler. The front splitter and rear diffuser are bespoke; the brakes achieve additional cooling.

Awesome. The transmission is typical muscle car in action, but you soon get used to the shift’s weight and then have the enjoyment of the programmed downshift blips.

There’s more to the soundtrack. So much more. The Mach 1 has an active variable exhaust system that can be made very LOUD if the driver uses the Drive Mode system to move out of Normal and into Track or Drag Strip modes.

Several times as I cruised out of a Taranaki town and spotted children on the roadsides waving American flags and cheering, I’d hold in Track mode, drop down to second gear and hit the accelerator. Well, everyone else seemed to be doing it…

This is the fourth generation of Mach 1, but the generation gap between each is especially wide.

The first was in 1969 when the Mach 1 was introduced as an optional performance-oriented version of the GT. It sure did the trick – while the GT achieved 5396 sales that year, the new Mach 1 achieved 72,458 sales, which prompted Ford to drop the Mustang GT badging for 13 years.

That first-generation Mach 1 continued until 1978, and Mach 1 specials returned briefly in 2003 and 2004. Then this one, from 2021. The next facelifted Mustang has been shown off Stateside and has yet to feature the type, but who’s betting the marketing department won’t be saddling up another at some point. As things stand, the hotshot of the freshened line is, quite literally, a Dark Horse.

Watching the progress of the Americarna fleet with its massive selection of newer cars and beautifully restored older models of flamboyant designs that only the Americans could have penned firmed my resolved to determine if there was an example of the one that started it all, a 1969 Mustang Mach 1?

So on a Thursday evening as Inglewood blocked off its CBD and parked the Americarna cars three wide along its main thoroughfares and set up food stalls, marquees, and a stage for a rock ‘n roll band, I parked my Mustang on a side street and went looking.

There were a lot of Mustangs that ranged from a 1964 ‘half’ model onwards, through fastbacks and convertibles, and even a SM17, the 578kW Scott McLaughlin Special Edition. This one was owned by 1990 national rally champion David Ayling (above), a local. But no Mach 1. Would my search end in Americarna-nah?

Then, from a distance I spotted a registration plate: 69PONY. Surely a dead giveaway? As I got closer I saw more clues authentic Wimbledon White paintwork, matte black bonnet stripe, bonnet pins and bonnet scoop. All the identifying features of the real McCoy.

And it was. Now owned by Tauranga man Warren Blakemore who has driven it for nine years, it was originally imported 33 years ago. It is powered by a 5.8-litre Windsor 351 V8 and has an FMX three-speed automatic transmission. The only things done to this Mustang that make it any different to the original is that the car’s two venturi carburettor has been replaced with a four venturi version, and it has different wheels. But he has the originals in storage.

Warren says his Mach 1 is lovely to drive. “I think it’s the meanest muscle car ever built,” he adds. “But you do have to remember that it is an old car, so such things as the brakes and steering aren’t anything like the modern-day versions. But I won’t change them – I’d feel criminal if I didn’t keep my Mustang as close as possible to the original.”

At 54 years of age, the ’69 Mach 1 still has a timeless look. As does the latest. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to mess with the look or the personality of that car, either.

Will the same be able to be said of the electric Mustang Mach-E? Somehow, I don’t think so.