IMSA GT, All American

This Mustang Cobra II was conceived and raced by Charlie Kemp, an experienced racer who had competed in the early SCCA Trans-Am series and then in the Can-Am from 1970 through 1973. He was clocked at 222 mph at Riverside driving a Porsche 917-10 in 1973. In 1975, IMSA introduced a new category, All-American GT, designed to add some domestic competition into their GT road-racing program. With Chevrolet already in with their tube-chassis DeKon Monzas, Kemp saw an opportunity to build a similar but better Ford-powered design for the 1976 season. His car’s tube chassis was designed by the legendary Bob Riley, and it used a Ford “Cleveland” 351 cubic-inch V-8 for power. Despite using body panels made from bucks taken off a production Mustang II and using a production-car roof panel and windshield, the car was undeniably radical in its appearance and caused a stir when rolled out of its trailer for the first time in early 1976 at the Daytona 24-Hour. For five seasons, Kemp was continuously at odds with IMSA, who argued that the design of the car ­pushed the bounds of rules interpretation. With some second and third place finishes to its credit, the car never actually won a race, but today it is recognized as the lone example of Ford “connective tissue” between the early Trans-Am period of 1966-1970 and the imminent onslaught of the tube-chassis revolution starting in 1981.