I won’t be shy. I’ll admit that the Pontiac GTO Judge was the car I desired when I was saving my pennies as I approached 16. I never ended up with the Judge (or a Goat, for that matter), but the soft spot I had then is still there. While visiting the 2024 Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals (MCACN), I spied one of the most unique Judges built.
Though GTO godfather Jim Wangers was a purist’s purist and thought the “WT1” Judge package should not last beyond 1969, Pontiac product planners felt differently and carried over the performance and cosmetic package into 1970. Since the GTO was restyled for that year, the spoiler and stripes were redesigned. The Judge logos remained, but the stripes were now “eyebrows” over the wheel arches, inspired by the 1950s Mercedes-Benz 300SL. Four variations of the stripes were available depending on the color of the car, visually separating the Judge even more from the 1969 version.
The default stripe trio assigned to Judges painted Polar White, Starlight Black, and Palladium Silver was yellow/red/blue. If a buyer wanted to choose one of the other stripe combinations for a particular hue, that was entirely possible, but rarely done. However, there was a special package-within-a-package for Judges that changed the stripe color normally assigned to white Judges: WT7.
What WT7 gave you was a flat black rear spoiler and yellow/red/black stripes (ordinarily used on Cardinal Red and Burgundy Judges). If you look at early promotional photos for the model year (such as ads and brochures), you’ll notice the Judge was in this combination. Pontiac fancied this combo as the signature Judge configuration, but early in the model year, product planners noted how sales were not meeting expectations. That led to the introduction of Orbit Orange, which has become the Judge’s signature color in most collectors’ eyes.
Pontiac produced 51 WT1/WT7 GTOs in 1970. They are difficult to document because the PHS invoice service won’t show anything that reflects the option since it cost zero dollars to the buyer—only a build sheet will offer this information. As such, documenting a real WT7 Judge is difficult. This one that appeared at the 2024 MCACN show is not one of them, but that’s where things get interesting.
Owned by Rob Anderson and restored by Darrell Davidson and Supercar Creations, this GTO Judge is a factory promotional model built before the WT7 option was officially in the channel. As such, it’s still a killer car because it’s the actual pre-production Ram Air IV Judge that was used to promote the model. There are 26 options on this Goat, including an electric rear window defroster, a tail lamp monitoring system, and power-flow ventilation. Additionally, this Judge had one owner from 1970-2004.
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