Car Owner: René LaRochelle Words & Photos: Clive Branson
René looked like a mobile Mount Rushmore – built like a brick house – and has the thick cadence of the northern Quebecois.
“I have always been a fast driver. I had a reputation, even amongst the police,” he stated with a self-satisfied look. “As far as I was concerned, the faster I drove, the better, y’know. I would challenge anyone who thought they could beat my car.”
He placed his thick hands on the kitchen table and leaned forward. “The fastest I’ve driven is 145 mph on a regular road. It was actually quite scary, but I’ve always been a rebel. My parents kicked me out of home. Schools kicked me out. The U.S. authorities kicked me out [because he was working without a U.S. working visa], and the Quebec police gave me two weeks to leave the province for inciting dangerous driving.”
And what car did René do all this in? A 1968 Shelby Mustang GT500 KR (Carroll Shelby had five years of marriage with Ford, 1964-1969, enabling Ford to challenge the Corvettes in SCCA racing. The 1968 Shelby GT500 KR Cobra Jet is the reigning success of that collaboration). The ‘KR,’ appropriately implied ‘King of the Road,’ wasn’t an ode to some comic book character, but sealed its place in history as the most powerful Mustang ever built as of 1968. According to various sources, the KR monogram was established before the car was ever designed. Allegedly, Carroll Shelby got wind that Chevrolet was planning on trademarking the same title, so he called his lawyer to trademark it immediately, much to the chagrin of Chevrolet.
“I’ve had this car since 1971,” René explained. “I bought the car for its engine and parts to modify another Mustang of mine so that I could challenge someone who owned a ’70 Cuda 440 six-pack that no one could beat in the region. But before I could confront him to a race, he got married and, on his wife’s insistence, sold his car. Now I was stuck with this car. I didn’t even realize how special the car was and during the 1980s, I tried to sell it twice for a mere $3,000. Can you believe it? Fortunately, there were no takers.”
It took a friend to tell René what he actually possessed and how rare it was, so René sold his other cars and concentrated on restoring the GT500 KR. “I am the second owner. The first was a teacher, but he had too much difficulty controlling the power of the car. It had so much torque, the wheels would spin in the tires!” His eyes squeezed as his husky voice curls around a baritone laugh. “When I drag raced on the amateur circuit, I would burn out two sets of tires every summer, but it got to be too expensive. It was economics that stopped me, not passion. If I had money, I swear, I would just drag race.”
By 1967, the GT500 housed a 428 V8, essentially a more suitable performance version of the 427 FE for the streets, but it wasn’t until 1968 that a brand new birth of the 428 (7 litre) Police Interceptor V8 engine, with improved heads and larger exhaust manifolds, was launched out of the stables. What emerged was the 428 Cobra Jet engine, baptized the GT500 KR. To prevent reducing sales due to rapidly escalating insurance surcharges, the output was ‘officially’ rated at 335 horsepower, but according to independent tests, the actual output was 410 horsepower, and more credible to the engine’s 440 pound-feet of torque, capable of accelerating from 0 to 60 in under 7 seconds, mind blowing numbers for 1968.
“I had the engine rebuilt professionally in Prince Edward Island but, over the years, have had the transmission changed six times. The car still contains the original 428 Cobra Jet engine.” René restored the car after clocking 90,000 miles and reset the odometer back to zero. The car was striped of its original Acapulco Blue Metallic livery to a menacing black appearance. To enhance its fierceness, the fattest Mickey Thompson wheels and tires were added to leave rubber at every streetlight.
It wasn’t until 2017 that René had a change of heart and gave the car a facelift, returning back to its Shelby originality. A body shop was finally chosen and after two hours of inspections, there were two options available: to tear down the car to its shell and replace what was salvageable or to purchase a new dii Dynacorn Full Body shell and start new and fresh. An appraiser suggested that either option would not really have any ill effect on the value of the car, as long as it was well documented during the restoration period. René chose the latter.
Starting from the back end of the car, new Shelby quarter panel extensions were fitted, and the rear of the car was massaged to a beautiful, seamless fit. However, new fenders and the original Shelby hood fitment revealed a gaping problem: The front clip/box was out of square. The manufacturer and supplier were contacted. It was discovered that the welding jig at the dii manufacturing stage was out of place. This resulted in poor fitments during welding; a few cars were shipped out before the mistake was caught. A consensus by the team, the owner and the supplier agreed that the dii body could not be returned for replacement due to the hours of labour already committed to the car. The supplier and manufacturer agreed to be responsible for the corrections to be made and also supplied the new parts with a stipulation that the work was to be done at a professional frame shop. The needed repairs were performed on a frame-straightening jig, bringing the measurements to perfection. At this point, meetings with the team and owner concluded that replacing the old parts with new ones was more practical than adding countless hours trying to repair the old original parts. Those parts were eventually saved and boxed for storage as original Shelby DNA. What wasn’t replaced was checked and cleaned.
The windshields and glass had remained in perfect condition. Under the Shelby RAM air induction hood, lies the original 428 Cobra Jet with a single four-barrel carburetor, mated with a C-6 Select Shift automatic transmission with a 3.50 ratio conventional rear axle and complemented by Shelby Sports 15” Shelby Spoke wheels. The insurance appraised the car, claiming that it is a genuine 1 of 993 Shelby Cobra GT500 KRs made.
I gazed at its curves and its seemingly flexed display of muscle with Mike Tyson-like strength ready to be unleashed. The GT500 KR is more than brawn it is sex appeal with brass nipples. The midnight black grill is accentuated by Lucas fog lamps below two elongated, air-sucking hood vents. Hot air extraction vents postulate themselves along the fastback’s sinewy lines, the Shelby’s racing stripes sweep across the side skirts and, of course, the Cobra Jet 428 emblems tattooed as a badge of honour.
And then there’s the sound. The thought makes my nose bleed. This is not a car furnished with a men’s club interior and show-us-to-the-polo-grounds coachwork. This is a car that, even when stationary, gurgles like a dog growling and snorts to life, emitting a raging scream. At the time, Car Life magazine quoted, “The car is so impressive, so intimidating to challengers, that there are no challengers.”
What makes this car rare is that the GT500 KR only had a three-month production run (May, June and July of 1968). The Ford Motor Company dropped the GT500 KR after ’68, right before Carroll Shelby stopped modifying Mustangs, ending production at a little over 1,200 units. Today, the KR is regarded as the ultimate Shelby Mustang produced and is among the most expensive muscle cars when it hits the auction block.
An amusing side note to entice greater GT500 KR sales was the marketing of an internal promo entitled The 1968 Summer Sales Program. The top salesmen would be rewarded with all-expense paid trip to Playboy resorts in Wisconsin or Jamaica while the top dealerships would receive promotional visits from Playboy’s elite Playmates. The Playmates attracted hundreds of potential buyers to gawk at the girls, ah, cars in dealerships across the United States and Canada. Lee Marvin, James Garner, Paul Newman, Kevin Costner and Bruce Willis are noted celebrities to have owned a GT500 KR.
Regardless of who has owned one, for René, it has been a 42-year relationship. “I feel like it’s a part of me. It’s almost like a third arm. These days, I worry too much about scratches or stones and pebbles hitting my car or windshield. I’m once again trying to sell it for my golden nest egg. It’s been a sweet ride.”
