Style And Performance Can Be Yours With The 1971 Pontiac Grand Prix SJ
When Pontiac debuted the Grand Prix in 1962, the combination of performance and luxury in a stylish package had landed right on time. If the Ford Mustang was the car for young folks who were looking for something that had good bones and seemed fun their first car, the Grand Prix was the car for the executive who wanted to both look stylish and run the road. Originally based on the full-size GM platform, in 1969 the Grand Prix moved to the new G-body platform (itself a stretched variation of the A-body chassis) and the result was, once again, exactly what the market was wanting: style and performance, just in a slightly smaller package.
How did the Grand Prix work in the muscle car era? It was simple: they were smaller than the Cadillac Eldorado or the Lincoln Continental by a significant margin, but it was plusher than a Mercury Cougar or a Dodge Charger. It wasn’t showy or shouty… you wouldn’t see Orbit Orange on the Grand Prix color charts and you wouldn’t be announcing your engine selection to the world via stickers, but you didn’t have to worry about power. You had plenty of horsepower and torque available thanks to a solid lineup of Pontiac V-8s and you had style that could compare to Rivieras, Thunderbirds, and other stylish coupes.
So, here’s a great question: if you are looking for a classic car, why should you consider a Grand Prix, like this 455-powered 1971 Model SJ example that is currently for sale on Hemmings Marketplace? Studying Pontiac’s offerings throughout the 1970s is like studying a civil war: one faction is mad with power. We know and celebrate those models, the GTOs, the Trans Ams, the Super Duty engines. On the other side of the conflict are the luxury-minded types, who wanted more comfortable interiors, styling that trended towards the formal, and the word “grand” before every model name. The Grand Prix and its A-body counterpart, the Grand Am, were the two models that managed to successfully find middle ground in that war.
The Grand Prix led the way into the 1970s era of the personal luxury coupe. While many use that term as a punchline translated as “overweight Malaise-era barge”, the true intention of a PLC was to the power, the performance and the comfort in a neat package. That’s what the Grand Prix excelled at, and that’s what you can bring home for a reasonable investment.
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