2004 Holden Monaro CV8 Coupe

Description

She was yet to be named Monaro and was presented at the 1998 Sydney International Motor Show as the ‘Commodore coupe’, although her creators had dubbed her ‘Monica’. When the cover was whipped off this rakish blue show car, as many as 200 observers burst into applause. Many believed this concept car should go into production and should be the new-generation Holden Monaro; prospective customers metaphorically queued. The Monica moniker came about because Holden design boss, Mike Simcoe, and a small team were working on this project after hours and in such secrecy that even their wives were not told (remember, this was in the 1995-96 time frame when Monica was a name much mentioned in the media, especially in the context of wives not being involved). The designers took a standard VT SS from the A-pillar forward. The pillars themselves were raked back two degrees so that the roof above the front seat occupants was about 45 mm lower but the standard VT windscreen could be retained. The doors, said Simcoe, were simple but 150 mm longer than those of the sedan. Their outer surface was the result of grafting the front of a VT rear door onto the rear of a front door. Clever. Holden executives hesitated to give the concept coupe the tick for mass production, and so some 38 months elapsed between this debut and the advent of the production V2 Monaro. Why ‘V2’? Because the new Monaro arrived, as it were, between Commodore shifts. Driven by recently-appointed Holden boss Peter Hanenberger, a deal was struck to export Monaros to the US as new-gen Pontiac GTOs. Some extensive re-engineering was involved and the VZ Monaro of 2004 had plenty of Pontiac in it: relocated fuel tank (ahead of the rear axle), a fantastic new exhaust system boosting peak power to 260kW (backed by 500Nm of torque), bigger brakes with Corvette C6 twin-caliper front discs and vented rears. Inside, the VZ acquired HSV-style additional gauges on top of the dash and more piano black highlights.