by Tabitha Hergest

Created on: December 17, 2009

To the wider motoring cognoscenti - that is, anyone outside Uncle Sam's back yard - the term "muscle car" will cause a snigger.

Where the wider world delights in such refined beasts as Ferraris and the circus acts of Lamborghini and Pagani - and even the muscular brutes that come from the Aston Martin stable - it has never produced a muscle car.  There is a good reason for that.

Curves.

You see, whereas, in America, you can go forever on one long, straight, road, in Europe, for example, there are tight hairpins and dicey swoops which a car has to be able to negotiate with a certain amount of probability that it will be in the same condition before as after the bend's execution.  But muscle-cars aren't about the finer points of handling.  No - the essence of the muscle-car is getting as much power on the road as possible.

The obvious analogy is the body-builder.  If a man makes the choice - and takes the trouble - to become so muscle-bound that his every part is bulging like an explosion in a granite warehouse, then he's probably not going to be highly adept at ballet or yoga. or any other occupation where suppleness and flexibility are more important than the hardness of your pecs.  But then, having made that choice, he will have steered down the road of Rutger Hauer and away from that of Rudolf Nureyev.

And so it is with your choice of car.  If you spend the best part of fifty grand on a muscle car, then you're not going to use it mainly for shopping - unless you're truly, erm, devoted.  Neither are you going to want to race through the Alps or the Pyrenees, taking in the beautiful scenery - unless you want to become part of that scenery.  Pure-bread muscle-cars such as the original Dodge Charger move like speed-boats but, thanks to their mediaeval suspension set up, handle like barges.  Their brakes, too, are not to be taken lightly - when you have an imminent appointment with a solid wall, it helps if the earliest appointment you can make for stopping is not three feet beyond that.  But even if the original breed was a bit of a one-trick pony, that one trick was something it performed very well.

So if you have an appointment with the horizon - then fire up the Mustang...

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