A Special Kind Of Fast

Jeff Smith Seeks the 9S With His Competition Orange 2004 SVT Cobra
 

- Michael Galimi

In 2004, Ford created just 281 SVT Cobra coupes slathered in the hue known as Competition Orange, making it the rarest color combo of the 3,768 coupes built that year. The color was offered in just one year of the two-year production run of the factory-supercharged specialty Mustang, and it is considered one of the most sought-after Terminators. That is why Jeff Smith made an impulse purchase—sight unseen—while browsing an online marketplace in 2011.

“I buy and sell Jeep Wranglers as a hobby and came across this Cobra,” says Smith. He notes that the ad was bland and unassuming. Since he knew that a Competition Orange Cobra is a rare find, not to mention the car had only 9,500 miles, he immediately scooped it up.

The car was advertised as stock; however, in Terminator terminology that meant it had a pulley, a cold-air kit, an after-cat exhaust, and a new tune courtesy of a Diablo Sport Predator. Smith later put the car on VMP Performance’s chassis dyno for some baseline pulls and to review the engine calibration. A few tweaks later, his rare Cobra laid down 474 rwhp, enough power to run 11.80s at the drag strip.

Smith’s first national competition was the NMRA Spring Break Shootout in 2012. Since the car was a consistent 11.80 player, he figured he would back it off a bit and chase the 12.00 index in QA1 True Street. A missed shift during the second of three consecutive runs meant he was out of contention, but that initial outing at the NMRA event opened a whole new world for Smith. In the course of a year, his Cobra was used as a magazine test car for a VMP Performance 2.3L TVS supercharger kit and with it came 10-second time slips.