All things considered, things are not going so well for the people in the country, and cabin fever can be a heck of thing to deal with, especially as a car person. With tracks operating at limited capacity (if they’re even open), and the majority of events just cancelled entirely, what’s a gearhead to do, besides being stuck at home? Several people have taken this situation and made lemonade out of it by using the cleared roads to break the Cannonball Run records, and another driver just broke it, in a rented Mustang GT.
The actual term became popular from the 1981 movie, “Cannonball Run,” with Burt Reynolds, Dom DeLouise and Dean Martin, but we’re sure people would still be attempting the feat under a different name had the movie not coined it. In essence, the Cannonball Run, also known as the ‘drive across America’, is basically a test to see how quickly a driver can get from one side of the country, to the other. We do need to stop here to note that this ‘tradition’ is highly illegal in every state, and we don’t encourage anyone to attempt to break the current records.
This coast to coast run begins in New York City at the Red Ball parking garage in Manhattan, and ends in Los Angeles, at the Portofino Hotel in Redondo Beach. According to Google Maps, this route will equate to a full 42 hour trip, but Cannonball runners would beg to differ.
When it started to fall under 30 hours in 2013, and with the added element of YouTube helping Unsurprisingly, the record has been broken several times since COVID-19 prompted lock downs across the United States.
While most Cannonball runners stay anonymous and work on teams, Fred Ashmore did neither. Ashmore rented a Mustang GT, prepared, and set out on his own, to not only break the solo record, but the overall record at 25:55 hours.
That’s minutes under the last record attempt of just at 26:00 hours, and that was completed by an unknown team earlier this year. It’s said that Ashmore averaged 108 miles per hour, and now we’re left wondering if the rental car company thought when they say this play out on their GPS trackers!
Elizabeth is hardcore horsepower enthusiast with unmatched intensity for making things faster and louder. She wakes up for power and performance and only sleeps to charge up for the next project that’s heading to the track. From autocross to drag racing, Elizabeth is there with you, so stay tuned for her unique perspective on horsepower news, builds, tech info, and installs — with her, it’ll never be boring!
