It's been over a decade since Ford last had a halo car in its range with the vital statistics to take on the likes of Ferrari, Porsche and Lamborghini, and in terms of performance figures and rarity alone, the new car – rolling off the production line in Ontario, Canada – should be worth the wait.

Powered by a twin-turbocharged 3.6-liter V6, the first road-going, customer-specified 2017 Ford GT can send almost 600hp to its rear wheels. And while that might not be as much as on offer from a Ferrari F12 Berlinetta or a McLaren 650S, its ultra-lightweight construction should ensure that what it lacks in outright horsepower, it makes up for in acceleration.

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The racing version of the new car won its class at this year's most important Le Mans, exactly 60 years after the original Ford GT 40 wrote itself into the history books with its never before (or since) achieved 1-2-3 finish.

Despite a lack of confirmed performance figures, plus the fact that the car will demand a $500,000+ premium (approx. RM2.2 million, pre-tax), Ford has been inundated with orders for the car, and could quite easily have sold over 6000 examples, rather than the initial 250 planned over the coming year.

Demand was so great for the car that Ford had to set up an online ordering system, where potential customers essentially had to justify why they should own one. Over the next four years the company aims to build a total of 1000 GTs and once the production mid-point is reached, the company will be relaunching the website in order to sell the second batch of 500.

(photos: Ford.com)

To see where the new GT came from, check out its predecessor, the GT40 that recently took centre stage at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.