The 2020 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 and BMW M8 Competition are very different performance cars that appeal to vastly different buyers. As this video shows, however, the duo are surprisingly well-matched down the quarter-mile.
Brooks from Drag Times recently organized four drag races between the duo to see which is the quickest and which is the most consistent at putting its power to the ground and getting off the line.
In the first race, the M8 Competition gets off the line a touch quicker than the Mustang thanks to its potent launch control system and supreme traction. However, the pony car was able to close in towards the end of the quarter-mile, setting a best time of 11.197-seconds compared to the 11.318-seconds of the GT500.
In the second race, the Ford got a much better launch and was able to breeze down the quarter-mile much faster than the BMW, recording a time of 10.553-seconds at 134.64 mph (216.68 km/h) to the 10.974-seconds at 127.13 mph (204.59 km/h) of the German two-door.
We won’t ruin the results for the third and fourth races but will say that both of them were very close and reveal that the Mustang does have some difficulties putting its power to the ground.
On paper, it is the Ford that has an obvious advantage. Thanks to a supercharged 5.2-liter V8 engine, it churns out an extraordinary 760 hp. By comparison, the 4.4-liter twin-turbo V8 of the BMW M8 Competition is good for 616 hp.