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Martini Mustang is a 'what if moment' gone right

Feast your eyes on a masterpiece. This is Steve Strope's Ford Mustang in the classic fastback bodystyle, and as you'll notice, it sports the signature colors of Martini Racing, a livery that's as legendary as any Gulf Racing-styled car. But the red, white and blues of the Martini stripe down this Mustang's middle tell only a very small part of the story, in the latest video from Petrolicious.
What would you guess is under the hood? A 289-cubic-inch V8? Maybe a 302, or some absurd Ford crate engine? Maybe Strope went all Tokyo Drift - he's actually responsible for the "Hammer" Plymouth Satellite driven by Vin Diesel at the end of the movie - and found an RB26DETT to drop into the pony car? You'd be wrong on all counts.
This mad, mad man somehow finagled a Ford-Lotus engine from a 1966 Indianapolis 500 car into the Mustang's engine bay. Yes, a Mustang with an engine designed for a 160-mile-per-hour, open-wheel racecar. That's like someone in 40 years dropping McLaren's 2.4-liter V8 from the MP4-28 into a Scion FR-S. It'd just make a monster.

Project Ugly Horse: Part VIII

Now With More EcoBoost
There's an EcoBoost 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder in there somewhere, and it's headed straight for Ugly Horse.
For the second time in my life, I'm staring at an engine in the back of a truck with no concept of how to get it safely into the garage by my lonesome. The first time this happened, I dragged home a $300 International 345 V8 in the back of my Scout Terra only to discover that the bounds of my manliness terminated well before my ability to muscle that 800-pound cast iron block out of the pickup bed.

Chris Harris checks out Ken Block's Hoonicorn '65 Mustang

Ken Block's Hoonicorn, which stars in Gymkhana Seven, might still bear a passing resemblance to a vintage 1965 Ford Mustang, but underneath the skin, the car is one of the baddest custom machines to ever do a smoky burnout on the road. The ever enthusiastic British auto journalist Chris Harris is now showing what really makes Block's new ride tick on video, and Harris even gets to go for quite a ride. The only Mustang components really left on the Hoonicorn are the A-pillar, B-pillar and roof, according to Harris. Everything else is ditched to create Block's ultimate Gymkhana tool. The 845-horsepower, 6.7-liter Rousch Yates V8 sits behind the front axle, and the grunt is routed to all four wheels through a Sadev gearbox usually found on Dakar Rally vehicles. The whole drivetrain is packed with cool little touches; like that giant handbrake that also disconnects power from the front wheels when in use. The superlatives about the Hoonicorn could go on forever, but settle in and let a very excited Harris tell you about just some of them. He's like a kid in a candy store here, and the look that combines surprise, fear and joy during his ride with Block is the kind that lacks a suitable word in the English language.