MotorMouths

The long-lived rawness and gristle that have defined Mustang for decades are still largely present, and the improvements have once again bettered the car while leaving its soul and character very much intact.

Bottom line, the new 2011 V6 Mustang won me over. It’s affordable at less than $23,000 MSRP, it’s powerful with more than 300 hp, and it gets great gas mileage with 31 mpg highway.

The 2011 Ford Mustang GT 5.0 is a fast, competent, well-sorted performance car that delivers M3-level performance at half the price.

The 2011 Ford Mustang V6 is not a high-performance muscle car. It is however a blast to drive, a fairly good value, and more than enough pony for most shoppers.

The 2013 Ford Mustang features a facelift and comes out bigger, bolder, cleaner. We’re less enthusiastic about the interior. But with 11 models ranging from 305 hp and about $23k to 650 hp and $60k, if you like Mustangs at all, there’s one for you.

You can still call the V-6 Mustang a chic car, Mustang Lite or anything else you can dream up, but it will knock your Piloti racing shoes into a ditch if you’re not paying attention. It can pass you on a mountain road, on the highway and at the gas station.

Who among the Mustang faithful wouldn’t want the fastest and arguably best Mustang ever? The 2011 GT500 is fabulously fast, ruggedly handsome and imposingly obvious.

The 2012 Ford Mustang Boss 302 is a track-tuned beast, and it should also be both great to drive and even potentially collectible.

Along with new manual and automatic transmissions — both with 6 forward speeds — Ford’s new engines represent the single greatest technological leap for the Mustang since it entered production 46 years ago.

They’re numbers that spit in the face of physics. Imagine, 305 horsepower and 31 mpg on the highway in a Ford Mustang. It’s not just any Mustang either, but the least expensive, easiest-to-insure 2011 Mustang V6.

The 2011 is much more than just a quicker Mustang. Its power is matched by the various other upgrades, and once again it’s a very balanced, unified package.

This is a reconstituted, reformed Mustang – a car so startlingly different in personality that you wonder if it’s on drugs or religion, or both. Actually, what it found was a refined, pumped-up new engine, a couple of six-speed transmissions, a retuned suspension and a credible performance package.