Ford

One of the best bellwethers of a person’s will to succeed is how he or she responds to adversity. The act of attaining fame and fortune when the odds are in your favor or, at the very least, 50:50, is well below most people’s noteworthiness thresholds. But achieving success when you’re dealt a bad hand separates the average from the above average.

When Carroll Hall Shelby, who died on Thursday aged 89 at Baylor Hospital in Dallas, Texas, was forced to end a very successful road racing career (in which he won three SCCA national championships and the 1959 24 Hours of Le Mans sharing a factory Aston Martin DBR1 with Englishman Roy Salvadori) in 1960 due to a chronic heart condition that actually left him bedridden for much of his childhood, he could have just resigned himself to taking some soul-sucking desk job, having nothing but memories of being in the thick of auto racing action. But as we all know, that’s not what he did.

On both a national and a global basis, the auto industry is the most competitive it has ever been. Companies that were bringing up the rear in areas like design, quality and technology scarcely a decade ago have now closed right up to the market leaders. These days, it’s almost impossible to name a truly lousy car brand.

So how are automakers supposed to separate themselves from the herd? Well, as the video after the jump explains, one strategy is for a car company to challenge its designers and engineers to dream bigger, and think of problems that have yet to be solved, then solve them. In other words, never be content with “good enough.”

With the opening round of the 2012 Formula Drift season just over a fortnight (That’s a fancy way of saying “two weeks”; who says we aren’t an educational website?) away on the streets of Long Beach, California, the excitement in the Sub5Zero editorial bunker is starting to build. Formula Drift’s ninth full season (The sport first arrived stateside as a one-off exhibition at Irwindale Speedway in 2003 followed by the debut Formula Drift event at Road Atlanta the following spring.) promises to be one for the ages, with an eclectic mix of cars, drivers and venues on tap. We’ll analyze the prospects for the 2012 Formula Drift calendar in due course, but first, let’s take a quick look back at 2011.

Just like this year’s, last year’s championship chase opened on the streets of Long Beach. Justin Pawlak came out on top in his Falken Tires Ford Mustang. Daijiro Yoshihara then took top honors at Road Atlanta for the second year in a row in his Falken Tires/Discount Tire Nissan S13. Pawlak was on top of the podium again at the end of round three in Palm Beach, while Hankook Tire Chevrolet Camaro driver Conrad Grunewald outlasted the competition to take top honors at the treacherous Wall Speedway in New Jersey. Yoshihara took his second win of the year at round five in Washington State, while Rhys Millen was victorious at Las Vegas, two years after he failed to qualify in the Red Bull Hyundai Genesis Coupe’s debut.

An overwhelming majority of sources assert that the Adam of the American muscle car species is the 1964 Pontiac GTO. It was certainly the first muscle car to be marketed toward leadfooted baby boomers, but it was not the first high-performance American passenger car. Nor was it the first American car to combine one of its maker’s big car engines with one of its small car body and chassis.

In short, the history of the muscle car stretches back many years before the O.G. Goat showed up. Just how rich is that history? Take a look at the following 10 factory hot rods and we think you’ll agree it’s pretty doggone rich.