No Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 in Chicago

The media days for the 2018 Chicago Auto Show have come and gone without any mention of the Ford Mustang Shelby GT500, so those waiting for the super-Stang will have to wait until New York in April as the next possible debut location.

Shortly after the 2018 North American International Auto Show opened in Detroit, Ford Motor Company issued a teaser video of the new Mustang Shelby GT500. That video (below) promised that the new GT500 will arrive in 2019, leading many people to believe that it will be a 2019 model year vehicle with a debut sometime during the 2018 calendar year. Provided that this is accurate, the new Shelby GT500 Mustang would make its formal debut at a major auto show sometime this year, with the most likely locations being Chicago, New York or Los Angeles.

Unfortunately, it seems like it won’t debut in Chicago, leaving us all waiting until at least April.

No GT500 in Chicago
The 2018 Chicago Auto Show opened to the media yesterday and media days end this afternoon. Ford used the Windy City show to introduce the new Transit Connect, but the Motor Company did not roll out a new Mustang in Chicago. The likelihood of Ford waiting until public days to introduce what will likely be the most powerful Mustang ever is slim-to-none, so it is safe to say that the GT500 will not debut in Chicago.

It doesn’t come as a huge surprise that Ford didn’t introduce the new Shelby GT500 Mustang in Chicago, but I am a little surprised that we didn’t get a new teaser video or some other small bit of information on the company’s greatest muscle car.

New York or LA
So, with no new GT500 in Chicago, the two most likely debut locations are New York City in April or Los Angeles in November/December. Of course, Ford could do a stand-alone debut event, but it seems unlikely that such an important car would debut away from the crowd of a major auto show.

It should also be noted that the speculation on the 2018 calendar year debut of the new Shelby GT500 relies on the car arriving for the 2019 model year. If the car is actually set to be introduced during the 2019 calendar year as a 2020 model, we might be having this same discussion at this time next year. However, my hope is that if Ford really does plan on waiting an entire year after the teaser video to introduce the new Mustang, they will pull the sheets off of the car in Detroit in January.