Pontiac GTO 1964 posters


Pontiac GTO

The Pontiac GTO was an automobile built by the Pontiac division of General Motors from 1964 to 1974, and by General Motors Holden in Australia from 2003 to 2006. It is often regarded as the first true muscle car and, from 1964 until 1973.5, it was closely related to the Pontiac Tempest. Its final year was based on the Pontiac Ventura. The 21st century GTO is essentially a left-hand drive Holden Monaro, which is a coupe variant of the Holden Commodore. Origins The GTO was created by Pontiac engineer Russell Gee and Pontiac head engineer John De Lorean. An idea previously suggested by Shane Wiser, the car was put together in response to the General Motors edict banning divisions from auto racing. Pontiac's marketing and advertising strategy heavily relied on performance, and its main source of performance was racing. Jim Wangers proposed a new approach that would keep Pontiac's performance image alive by concentrating more on street performance. This involved replacing the era-typical front-engine, front-transmission, rear-wheel-drive Tempest, with a modified version with the larger 389 Pontiac V8 engine from the Bonneville and Catalina vehicles. Thus, the "Super Tempest" was born and was advertised as a special performance model to appeal to the speed-minded youth market - which had also been recognized by Lee Iacocca, who was then preparing the Ford Mustang. The name "GTO" was De Lorean's idea and it stands for "Gran Turismo Omologato", which is Italian for homologated for racing in the GT class. This name did not go down well with purists and they viewed it as being close to blasphemous.

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