Final BOSS

RINGBROTHERS PUMPS A 1969 MACH 1 MUSTANG FULL OF STEROIDS AND SHOVES 800 HORSES UNDER THE BONNET TO CREATE ‘Kingpin, ONE OF THE MEANEST PONY CARS EVER TO HIT THE STREETS

- BORIS VISKOVIC

IF THE last Ringbrothers car we featured – the Aston Martin DBS V8 dubbed 'Octavia' (SM, Nov '25) – was the James Bond hero car, then this '69 Mach 1 Mustang is most definitely the villain.

When the owner, Jake Hodess, brought the car to the award-winning Wisconsin-based workshop, he had a pretty simple brief: black paint, no chrome, and an interior that looks like a tuxedo. The rest of the details were left to Ringbrothers' Mike and Jim Ring and their team, along with Ragle Design (which also worked on Octavia), and the result, known as 'Kingpin', is an even more pumped-up version of one of the best-looking muscle cars to ever hit the road.

“The Mustang Mach 1 has always been an aggressive-looking car, and the client was adamant about creating a sinister aesthetic,” says Jim Ring. “We asked ourselves: ‘What would the final boss in a John Wick film drive?’ This was the result.”

While Ringbrothers is becoming renowned for making carbonfibre-bodied cars, this wide-body Mustang was created the old-fashioned way by splitting the quarters, pulling out the wheel opening, and then filling in the gaps. It's wider than stock by just under four inches at the rear and two inches at the front. "I think it took me four quarters and four front fenders to do this car," says Mike Ring.

"If you look down a regular '69, the front and rear fenders are a pretty straight line, whereas these hourglass out. I had a lot of help from Bryce Hilton at Moselle Panel & Paint in New Zealand. He came over for about a month; he's a super-talented metal guy."