SAAC World Registrys

What a veritable masterstroke! This hardbound heavyweight [1,618-pages, 7-1/2 pounds/ 3.4 kgs; 2,848 individual photographs… just for a few jaw-dropping statistics] encompasses just about everything you’d ever want to know about the original Cobra roadsters (260s, 289s and 427s), Peter Brock’s Daytona Coupes, and the Ford GT40s from the MkIs and MkIIs through the MkIVs. It’s my considered opinion that if it’s not in these pages, you don’t need to know it. This book is the crowning achievement of 38 years of investigating, researching, collecting and assembling data on virtually every aspect and every historical detail of these Cobra roadsters, Daytona Coupes and GT40s.

It also appropriately includes coverage of Superformance’s lineup of 427 roadsters, Daytona (Brock) Coupes, and GT40s, as well as the Kirkham lineup of aluminum-bodied Cobra 427 and 289 Cobra roadsters.

Special kudos from CobraCountry to the ‘A-Team’ of this 4th Edition: Rick Kopec (Editor and chief coordinator), and the Registrars:

• Ned Scudder (original Cobras and Cobra Daytona Coupes)

• Greg Kolasa (original Ford GT40s)

• Jeff Burgy (2005 & 2006 Ford GTs)

• Mike Stenhouse (Superformance Brock Coupes and Superformance GT40s)

• Carl Sauer (AC MkIVs), and

• Kevin Rogers (CSX 4000-Series Cobras).

These six individual Registrars—who have been gathering and assimilating information regarding specific models of Shelby metal for years—contributed the results of their work for this book. Everything was assembled and edited into a user-friendly format which is consistent from car to car. The result is a veritable encyclopedia of details on these extraordinary drivin’ machines. Nothing like this has ever been published before.

Beyond being a mere registry which provides the serial numbers, names of current and past owners, production dates and details and individual histories of each Cobra and Ford GT40 produced-which this book does in amazing detail—it also provides the context in which these cars were produced and raced. No car pops up from a vacuum. Things preceded and shaped each model, in the process fitting each of them into a continuum. This book explains the history of that continuum, viewing the cars through the equivalent of a wide-angle lens, but stopping to examine each one individually with a close-up lens.

It would be enough for this book to examine only the original Cobras and GT40s produced in the 1960s; but this volume goes a step farther. It not only specifies what are the characteristics which make a Cobra or a GT40 the genuine article; it examines—in exquisite detail—the cars produced after the 1960s and explains why they cannot be categorized as “originals.” The reason for including this wide variety of latter-day Cobras and GT40s is because-at some point in the future-there is an excellent chance of their being mistaken for originals. That confusion would only serve to diminish the uniqueness of the original cars and would adversely affect their value. So this book goes into great detail to establish not only “what is” but “what isn’t.”

This world-class World Registry will keep you entertained and qualify you as fully informed for weeks and months and years to come!