Monday 22 June 2015

Car and Driver Tested: The 12 Quickest Cars of the 1960s

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The 12 Quickest Cars of the 1960s

The 1960s are known for muscle cars, and this decade saw acceleration times plummet greatly from those of the previous decade. The quickest car from this time period was a full 1.3 seconds better than the top dog from the bobby-soxer epoch. Here are the quickest-accelerating cars from the kickin’ ’60s; the list stretched to 12 vehicles due to ties. Carroll Shelby would be very proud.

Be sure to also take a spin through the quickest cars we tested in the 1950s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and also from 2000 through mid-2015.

12. 1969 Chevrolet Corvette 427 — 5.3 seconds (tie)

September 1969

11. 1968 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28 — 5.3 seconds (tie)

July 1968

The Lime Rock pit straight is a wavy, gray blur. Up front two roaring Holleys are trying to suck a hole in the at­mosphere. "A 7000 rpm redline? Christ Almighty, it's gonna burst." But it doesn't, and Sam Posey snaps the shift lev­er into fourth at seven grand as the speedometer climbs past 110 in one of the absolute wildest street machines ever to come out of Detroit. No question about it: we're in the middle of one of the most beautiful goddam road tests in the annals of mankind. READ MORE >>

10. 1966 Plymouth Satellite 426 Hemi — 5.3 seconds (tie)

April 1966

9. 1964 Porsche 904 — 5.3 seconds (tie)

September 1964

8. 1965 Ford Mustang GT 289 — 5.2 seconds

October 1964

7. 1969 Plymouth Road Runner 426 Hemi — 5.1 seconds (tie)

January 1969

6. 1967 Ford GT40 Mark III — 5.1 seconds (tie)

June 1967

5. 1968 Dodge Charger 426 Hemi — 4.8 seconds

November 1967

4. 1967 Chevrolet Corvette 427 — 4.7 seconds

May 1967

The Corvette has come a long way since it was introduced in 1953. In the beginning, the Corvette was a cute little two-seater. It sure enough looked like a sports car, but underneath the radical fiberglass bodywork was a puny 235 cu. in., 150-horsepower "Blue Flame" six and a two-speed Powerglide transmission. Everybody laughed. Even Thunderbird owners knew they had something closer to a sports car. READ MORE >>

3. 1964 Pontiac Tempest GTO — 4.6 seconds

March 1964

Most knowledgeable enthusiasts reacted negatively when Pontiac announced that their new Tempest sports model was to be called the GTO. They felt, as we did, that Pontiac was swiping a name to which it had no right. Like Le Mans, Grand Prix, Monza, Spyder and 2+2, this was another of those hard-to-digest bits of puffery from the Detroit/Madison Avenue axis. Our first look at the car made us feel a little better, because it is handsome, and then we got a call from correspondent Roger Proulx, raving about the car's acceleration and handling, so we arranged to test a Pontiac Tempest GTO. READ MORE >>

2. 1963 Shelby Cobra 260 — 4.5 seconds

March 1963

1. 1965 Shelby Cobra 427 — 4.3 seconds

November 1965

Several years ago, the manufacturers of a posh Brit­ish grand touring car got a fair amount of mile­age out of the claim that their vehicle could accelerate from 0–100 mph and brake to a complete stop in less than 25 seconds. READ MORE >>

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