Reply to "I just read Bill Mason's diaries..."

I wonder where Mr. Mason is today or if he is even alive. When he wrote his diary for Pantera International, he would bring portions of the manuscript to me to go over. He was a fascinating person and crazy about Panteras. I once spoke with a gentleman who went for a test drive with Bill and it scared him nearly to death. I had a similar experience, when I bought my first Pantera in 1974 from a LM dealer, Gustafson in Long Beach, the salesman took me for a test ride.
The driver asked me, "have you ever ridden in a car, flat-out in 5th gear?". I told him no and I didn't intend to, at least with him behind the wheel. In any event, he ignored my comment and was winding the crap out of the Pantera. The shifter was clicking through the now famliar ZF shift gate as the 351 gathered up steam. It was a new experience for me. At that point Linda and I owned a 1970 Challenger 440 4-BBL which was damn fast but not like a Pantera by any means.
As the Ricky Racer/salesman was trying to impress me, in the distance, I could see a traffic signal facing us phasing to amber and the moron was still flat out, I could also see cars awaiting the green light at the intersection. In my mind, I could not see how we could clear that intersection on a yellow light. There was simply no time to stop either and the Pantera was still eating up the tarmac. In any event, we barely made it through the intersection on the signal clearance phase, (I think it was Willow and Lakewood Boulevard in Long Beach.) The salesman was all proud of himself as he drove me back to the dealership. I was really torqued because at 130+ MPH, any collision would have been unsurvivable. I told him I thought what he did was insane and unforgivable. In the back of mind, I knew I had to have a Pantera................