The Badlands is a sleeper?

[Davexxxx]

My Wife came home with a sly grin on her face yesterday, as she told me "I beat a Mustang".

The story goes, that she was at an intersection, where the lanes converged a short distance beyond. A Mustang pulls up next to her, revving its engine and jumping forward, looking over at her etc. She figured he wanted to get in front of her for the lane convergence and she was in just the sort of mood to disallow that. Or try to.

Said when the light changed, she hit the gas and it wasn't even close.

I asked if she'd switched to sport mode and she said it never even crossed her mind.

Now, not all Mustangs are bad asses but a good number of them are and that guy was acting like his was, so ...

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[DWG]

The 2.0L is pretty peppy or the guy was just acting like a jerk and didn't even try after being a jack $*&%#@! at the stop light trying to show off how great his car is. Maybe he was trying to intimidate your wife with his mustang being the jerk that he is. He picked the wrong person.

 

[Quashish]

if it were an actual race i doubt the sport would come out ahead even against an ecoboost mustang. might be a close one though.

 

[Rockboz]

I don’t know, back in 82 my friend beat a Porsche 924 in his lowly Chevette. As the light went green they both took off, at the shift point my friend yanked on the emergency brake to get the rears to chirp briefly. This sent the Porsche driver into a dit of laughter, and he never recovered. We all laughed at the next light and then the Porsche beat us mercilessly.

 

[Mark S.]

if it were an actual race i doubt the sport would come out ahead even against an ecoboost mustang. might be a close one though.

It depends. I traded a 2017 EcoBoost Mustang for my Badlands. The Mustang had a manual transmission. I'm pretty sure the Badlands would take that Mustang light-to-light. Now, a quarter-mile race would be different. Driven correctly, however, the newer EcoBoost Mustangs with the 10-speed auto will eat a Badlands for lunch.

 

[Davexxxx]

I don't name inanimate objects but after that, she decided to call it BB. Badass Badlands.

 

[B-Dog15]

I’ve seen some people rip around pretty hard in that 2.0L. Seems to push the baby Bronco pretty fast!

 

[Escape2Bronco]

In Sport mode it pulls away from the light pretty quickly. But…. The 2.3 EcoBoost Mustang is about 2-3 seconds faster to 60 compared to the 2.0 Badlands

 

[Superdave]

In Sport mode it pulls away from the light pretty quickly. But…. The 2.3 EcoBoost Mustang is about 2-3 seconds faster to 60 compared to the 2.0 Badlands

Car and Driver has the new 2.3 liter Ecoboost Mustang at 4.5 seconds 0-60 and the Badlands at 5.9 seconds 0-60. The Badlands is quick for what it is!

 

[freebob]

My Wife came home with a sly grin on her face yesterday, as she told me "I beat a Mustang".

The story goes, that she was at an intersection, where the lanes converged a short distance beyond. A Mustang pulls up next to her, revving its engine and jumping forward, looking over at her etc. She figured he wanted to get in front of her for the lane convergence and she was in just the sort of mood to disallow that. Or try to.

Said when the light changed, she hit the gas and it wasn't even close.

I asked if she'd switched to sport mode and she said it never even crossed her mind.

Now, not all Mustangs are bad asses but a good number of them are and that guy was acting like his was, so ...

mustang 5.1 badlands 5.9 close

 

[sajohnson]

Here's what I found:

Those 2 are the slowest relatively late model Mustangs listed.

Maybe the Mustang driver was kidding around -- or really slow off the line.

C&D clocked the 2025 Badlands at 5.9 seconds:
https://www.caranddriver.com/ford/bronco-sport

For perspective:

Historically, ~6 seconds 0 to 60 was considered fast.

For a decade or or more, the (factory stock) Mustangs were all slower than the Badlands:
https://www.zeroto60times.com/compare-cars/

 

[jkernitzki]

My '75 Vega would eat Porche 914s for lunch, straight or twisty. Didn't beat the repo man, though.. ?

 

[RSH]

Agreed, the Badlands is a sleeper. It will get your attention when hitting the gas, and in sport mode even more so.

 

[MoFoCo]

Agreed, the Badlands is a sleeper. It will get your attention when hitting the gas, and in sport mode even more so.

Just watch out for that torque steer! You'd think with all the fancy traction control and lane centering tech the BS has, Ford would have found a way to reduce the effect.

 

[sajohnson]

Just watch out for that torque steer! You'd think with all the fancy traction control and lane centering tech the BS has, Ford would have found a way to reduce the effect.

Exactly.

Our Badlands is really my wife's vehicle. I rarely drive it. I'm used to my 2002 WRX. Even though it's running Cobb Stage 2 it accelerates hard with no drama.

When I floor the pedal in the Badlands it definitely launches hard, but the front end comes up a lot and the steering feels light -- like a pickup truck with too much weight in the bed.

That's on a straight highway from maybe 30 MPH. I haven't used full power coming out of a curve, but I'll bet that's interesting.

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