Although the news has been official for almost a year now, today the general public got its first glimpse of the 2004 Pontiac GTO production trim showing at the LA Auto Show.

The car will come with the exact same engine/transmission combo found in the Corvette and Camaro, but is rated at a very strong 340hp (compared to the estimated 305hp of the 2005 Mustang it will compete with). It was originally thought that the base version was going to be 380+ horsepower, but that’s not the case. A lot of people think they didn’t want to tread on the same ground as the 350hp base Corvette. Look for an even more powerful model later in 2005 that will go heads-up with the 390hp Mustang SVT Cobra. Anyone who said “the pony car wars are over and Ford won” were dead wrong.