No R33 Skyline Love?

>Don't get a 25 yr old turbocharged AWD Japanese high end sports car, you should instead get an American RWD V8 instead.

You aren't a brainlet because you like mustangs as they are great cars, you're just a brainlet for having this type of thought and then actually typing it out and putting it on a forum.

God it must be boring living in a flyover state

My advice though is do the gearset first. Once you get a good feel for it if you feel like RPMs need to be lower across the board then get a final drive change. A taller final drive (lower ratio) will increase RPM drop across gears and generally cost you some acceleration.