Growing up in Detroit, Matt Korczyk had heard about this Ford Mustang long before he ever saw it. A V10-powered Mustang coupe, built in secret, and one of one. Somebody had seen it. Somebody had a photo. Somebody knew an engineer who worked on it. Then, years later, Korczyk found himself standing next to the car. Today, as Ford’s Heritage Fleet Manager, he’s responsible for taking care of it. “It was one of those cars that almost felt mythical,” he says. “Now, I’m one of the people responsible for taking care of it, which is still a little crazy for me to think about.” For someone who grew up hearing stories about the car, getting to drive it, maintain it, and help tell its story is about as good as a job gets.
Recently, Korczyk and the Heritage Fleet team worked with members of the original crew to bring the Mustang back to life after years of sitting. That meant new electronics and going through systems that hadn’t been touched in decades. The goal wasn’t to make the car faster, but to get it back to the way its designers intended. That eventually meant putting it on the dyno. When the V10 fired up, Korczyk says everyone in the room stopped talking. The engine has a sound that’s completely out of place in today’s world, raw, mechanical, and most definitely experimental. Then came the magic number, more than 510 horsepower at the wheels.
Still, the horsepower wasn’t the part Korczyk remembers most. Standing around the dyno were Greg Coleman, Jim O’Neill, Paul Vella, Don Masch, Mike Shelby, and their supervisor, John Brune, the same people who built the car roughly 25 years ago. They spent countless nights and weekends machining parts, solving problems, and proving that a V10 Mustang could actually work. Witnessing it run again brought all of those feelings back. The guys weren’t grinning ear to ear because of a number on a screen, but because their passion project was still alive.
That’s what makes Korczyk’s role with the Heritage Fleet such a dream job. He’s not looking after old cars, but instead, preserving them to keep their stories alive. The V10 Boss 351 is certainly a wild piece of Mustang history, and one that never came close to production, but it’s also a reminder of what can happen when a group of engineers decides to build something simply because they can. And now, decades later, Korczyk gets to make sure that story never disappears. For a car that was once a little rumor among Detroit car guys, that’s a pretty good ending.
