What are muscle cars and what makes them different ? What makes a muscle car different than your every day family car? Muscle car is not just a car but it is a legend. A legend that will live forever. The muscle car all started in 1961 and lasted till 1972. It all started in the fifties with a group of people that were called hot roders. They where striving for the need for speed, the three big car makers thought they should get in to racing and they did . In 1961 they started producing factory race cars with high horsepower and lots of light weight items to increase speed . These cars were raced by people that worked all week long and raced on the week end . The cars changed from cars int