2007 Nitto Tire King of the Street - Battle For The Throne

'91 Mustang GT
Palatine, IL
Horsepower: 1
Ride and Drive: 8
Engineering: 8
Drag Race: 5
Fit and Finish: 9
Popular Vote: 7
Total Score: 46.6

We saw CJ Williams' '91 GT in person at the NMRA/NMCA Super Bowl of Street Legal Drag Racing at Joliet a few months prior to the Nitto Tire KOTS. We were dually impressed with the car, and knew he had a good chance of making it into the final call. Not only was it the lone Fox car, but it was also the only car using nitrous as its primary power adder. Those two features, and the fact that his GT was one of the nicest Fox cars we've seen, CJ and his GT made the trip from Palatine, Illinois, to Bowling Green for the KOTS.

Obviously, the first thing you notice is the paint. CJ says he has $24,000 in the paint alone. Incaudo's Auto Body applied the House of Kolors Wild Strawberry with Candy orange flames, but did so after shaving the door handles and adding a Cervini's Auto Designs cowl hood and Stalker front bumper cover. The car was painted in January 2006, but seeing zero harsh Midwest winter has enabled it to shine to this day. Of course, CJ's impeccable treatment of the car has a lot to do with that, too. The Weld Racing Magnum big 'n' littles also contribute to the exterior's persona.

Inside, you're greeted with an interior redone by Goldstar Automotive with custom leather upholstery, new carpet, new billet trim items, and a new headliner. After checking out the Auto Meter gauges, we turn the key only to hear perhaps the most intoxicating exhaust note coming from the 347 stroker. CJ's GT utilizes custom 1 7/8-inch long-tube headers and a 3-inch X-shape crossover, as well as Flowmaster three-chamber mufflers with dumps. Most dump systems beat you to death with sound pulses, but the GT's exhaust was perfect. You could still carry on a conversation while driving the car, which is usually impossible in so-equipped Fox Mustangs.

To summarize CJ's GT, the only two drawbacks we saw on the Ride and Drive was the lack of A/C and the presence of manual steering. The car featured awesome brakes, the aforementioned exhaust note, and custom interior to bolster the Ride and Drive experience, but the lack of those two creature comforts resulted in CJ's GT scoring an 8 in the Ride and Drive. Even with the nitrous-injected 347, CJ scored dead last in the Horsepower segment with a corrected 512 hp, and that really hurt his final score. He made up for that shortcoming by scoring an 8 in Engineering and a 9 in the Fit and Finish category. Thanks to a wounded tranny, CJ was only able to muster a 12.20 at 123 mph in the Drag Race portion, which resulted in a 5. However, the GT was also able to hang a wheel on the launch using the Nitto Extreme Drag radials. CJ had quite a few friends in attendance at Bowling Green, and scored a 7 in the Popular Vote category. The GT did well in most categories, but the lack of power compared to its fellow KOTS competition really hurt his final score.