Pantera Owners Club of America

The Pantera is De Tomaso’s most significant production car to date, and lived an overall production life of nearly 25 years. It is the model which most people identify with De Tomaso, and completed the company’s transition to a volume producer of high performance GTs. In describing the Pantera’s career, especially from a U.S. perspective, it is easiest to view it in three separate stages: the Ford importation era (1971 - 1974), the post-Ford era (1975-1990) and the final iteration (1991-1994), as these last Panteras were substantially different than all prior machines.

The Mangusta was a major step in the evolution of De Tomaso for several reasons. At approximately 400 units produced, it was the largest production run to date for the company. Secondly by being V-8 powered, it moved the company into more direct competition with other Italian specialty automakers.

The Vallelunga is commonly acknowledged as DeTomaso Automobili's first production model. Its name comes from a race course in Italy, and its mid-engined chassis design from various DeTomaso open wheel-racers. The first Vallelunga was shown in 1962 as an open roadster with aluminum coachwork somewhat reminiscent of a Porsche 550 Spyder. The next three cars, built by Fissore and also rendered in alloy, were coupes; their styling was very similar to the final production version. By the time the car was ready for production in 1965, Ghia was engaged to construct the bodywork, in fiberglass.

The Guara represents DeTomaso’s first all new model of the 1990s. Built upon a central spine chassis, this mid-engined design conceptually recalls the original Vallelunga. The Guara was conceived with exceptionally high performance as its main goal.

First shown in concept form at the Geneva Motor Show in 1993, the Guara went into production in 1994. It is available in closed coupe, spyder (with a removable roof section) or barchetta (full open roadster) form. The Guara’s body panels are rendered in combinations of fiberglass, Kevlar and other composite materials. The styling was done in-house by DeTomaso.

Given that the Pantera's largest market was the United States, its unfortunate that the car did not enjoy a long or particularly successful American racing career. Perhaps this stems from the car's rather short U.S. market life, and from the lack of racing development invested in it. Ford had won everything in sight in the sixties with its GT40 program, Lotus/Ford Indy cars, and Shelby's Cobras. Sports car and endurance victories were not as high on Ford's priority list as NASCAR development and (unfortunately) the first U.S. gas shortage.Hu Kleinpeter built one of the better-developed cars. Kleinpeter was involved with the distribution of ZF transaxles, so the connection with the Pantera made sense.The car featured a Can Am style fuel injection system and many fiberglass panels, but reportedly began life as a production Pantera. It was driven by Janet Guthrie in the Daytona 24 Hour enduro in 1972, but DNF'd. It was later purchased by Vic Manuelli, who drove the car to an SCCA National Championship for A-Sports Racing cars in 1981 (beating a former factory Ferrari BB512 LM in the process).

Panteras and other De Tomaso cars have appeared in numerous movies and television shows over the years.  Panteras have appeared in car classics such as Gone in 60 Seconds and popular shows such as Hawaii 5-0.  Mangustas have appeared in Kill Bill and Kylie Minogue's video.

POCA member Garth Rodericks has assembled a list of these media appearances on his Banzai Runner Pantera website.