Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 vs Ford Mustang Boss 302

Ok, so I know its been well over 2 months since I last did a review. But this time I am back and I will hopefully try and get reviews out as quickly as I possibly can. I'm not gonna waste any time, because this week I am doing my 1st car battle since the Lambo Gallardo vs Audi R8 5.2. So sit back and enjoy this one. Now then, instead of flying to Uzbekistan or Germany I have decided to stay here in America and review 2 of the newest cars to come out of Detroit, both cars are high performance models of the current line of legendary cars that have helped shape the 2 companies into what they are today. So lets get started with Chevrolet, as we all know Chevrolet makes the Camaro, they have since 1967, but this time they wanted to make the Camaro more bonkers than what it already is, so here is what they decided to come up with.



The Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 is the most hardcore version of the Camaro line in its legendary history. Now as we all know General Motors have some sort of fascination in putting a Twin-Screw Supercharged V8 in its models, most notably in the CTS-V and the Corvette ZR-1, and that is exactly what they done with this car, they have taken basically the same engine out of the CTS-V, given it a bit more horsepower and threw it in the Camaro. The ZL1 produces a staggering 580 horsepower and 557 pound feet or torque, the only downside to it is that now the car weighs over 2 tons, which as well all know, weight in a car like this is bad, it spoils the handling, the launch, the braking, even the fuel mileage.



Now I decided to go over to the other side of Detroit(and not try and get shot) so I eventually ran into my friends at Ford, and after they found out I had been over at the legendary bowtie maufactuerer, they decided to put me in their newest model, although this one is a revival of quite possibly my personal favorite model from their also very legendary Muscle Car, here it is.







The 2013 Ford Mustang Boss 302 is exactly what it sounds like, a revival of their legendary 302 line from back in the 70's that won the 1970 Trans-Am Championship with Legendary Driver Parnelli Jones. Now Ford and Saleen, along with Jones himself compromised a model to celebrate the achivement back in 2007. But that was basically built on a Ford with some Saleen help, this Mustang Boss 302 is a direct revival of the street version of the model(although they also announced they would make a 302R model as well, along with the 302 Laguna Seca to bridge the gap). This car is also features alot of upgrades from its standard model, it gets a brand new 5.0L V8 engine producing 444 Horsepower, and it actually drops some weight, weighing about 200-300 pounds less than the standard Mustang Model, despite them taking over 10 lb-ft of torque over the equivalent GT.



Now both cars are featured in Forza Motorsports 4 as apart of the brand new August Playseat Car Pack, with the Mustang being the pack exclusive car. Here are the stats and the Good Stuff for both cars compared side by side in the proverbial showroom.


Now with all the upgrades the Camaro received, it has a near 60 point advantage over the Mustang once both sitting inside the showroom, and trust me you can feel the difference. The Camaro on the track was an absolute monster on the straights, not too bad in the corners. The Mustang, however was no slouch itself as it could keep up with the Camaro in the straights and actually make up more of the time through the corners, despite the stats being realatively one sided. Now normally here I would say about the things I would tackle with both cars, that will return next week when I review my next car(spoiler: its at the bottom), so this, along with the "upgrades" section will return in next week's review.

So I took both cars into the garage, and ran straight into a problem, the Camaro, while very fast, was too heavy and slow in the corners to be competitive in A class, the Mustang had plenty of play, but once I started to put on the upgrades I found out that I would have to go either Full Slicks or Full Weight Reduction to keep it in A class, so I eventually decided to bump both up into S class and try my luck there. Below you will see the Stats and Good Stuff of both cars tuned to the top of S class(700 for the people who don't know )






As you can see, once again the stats are clearly dominated by the Camaro, the Mustang only winning in the Speed category, but as everyone says, the stats are too deceiving in this game. Both cars showed tremendous improvement in the places they struggled the most, however the Mustang was very hard to control through the corners as everytime I tried to touch the throttle it would just want to start drifting, the Camaro however became one of my favorite S class cars to drive, I know its not the prettiest car on god's green earth but it surprised me with how good it truly was with all the upgrades. I then took both cars into the tune setup section, gave both cars a basic tune and showed that the Camaro's adjustments just made the car that much better, the Mustang however decided to rebel against my decisions and actually became a worse car. So I decided to take them to the track and thrash them around, and here are the laptimes.



NOTE: I took away 2 of the tracks as I felt overhwelmed with doing 5 tracks for both cars, so I eventually decided to take away Suzuka and Mugello from my review. They will most likely not return to my review starting next week. So my review tracks currently stand at Road America(no surprise there), Nurburgring GP and Catalunya Grand Prix.






The Stats and Good Stuff were in the Camaro's favor, and the laptimes really showed why, the Mustang was just too tail happy to attempt to keep it on the track for a really fast lap time. The Camaro, however, was just absouletly fantastic, it did whatever I wanted it to do and was just tremendous through the corners and had the grunt to keep up with anything on the straightaways. So, to be honest, as you can tell by the laptimes, stats and good stuff, and how I'm talking right now, the choice really is clear.



WINNER: Chevrolet Camaro ZL1

Loser: Ford Mustang Boss 302

I chose the Camaro as the winner because it was just clearly the better car, I know Live4xtc has said in the shoutbox that is a tremendously ugly car, and I can somewhat agree on that, but in the end, looks are only skin deep, this car really won my heart over, it is now quite possibly my favorite car in Forza today. I will re-attempt to tune the Mustang as I feel like that car has PLENTY of potential in S class along with A class, so thats the only thing the car really won over in this review is that it can be competitive in both A and S class, but for this review, the Camaro is shining brightest.



Well thats it for this week, tune in next time for more as I finally do head back overseas and review a car that has won over the hearts of millions, but is also quite possibly the scariest car in the world today. Thats right, I head back to Italy, but not to review a Ferrari or a Pagani, next week, its Bobbo...vs...The Lamborghini Aventador, stay tuned for that epic fight.



NOTE 2: I will be reviewing the Camaro again here soon, just gotta try and find a way to make this car competitive against the biggest Ford Mustang of them all, The 2010 Shelby GT500

Glad to see the reviews make a return, aswell as these 2 giants. Havent tried either of these cars but the camaro does appear to be the better of the 2

A good read. Well done, Bobbo.

I feel a bit guilty about reading it yesterday and not leaving a comment as i know bobbo likes to see peoples feedback on his reviews.

The review in my opinion is one of your best and it shows that you've really put some effort into this, unfortunately the new modern muscle doesn't interest me in the slightest. Good read though none the less.