The Cobra wasn’t born in a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder, sitting there when the dust cleared just waiting to take on the sports car world. It was a longer and more involved process which actually had its roots back in the 1950s, when Shelby was racing sports cars. After seeing some British and Italian sports cars close up and the small specialty shops where they were made, Shelby began to think about building a sports car of his own. An American car. However, at this point it was little more than one of those “some day...” projects we all think about when our body is in neutral but our mind is racing.