In 1966, a trio of Ford GT40s dominated the race - the underlying rivalry between both automakers would forever live in automobile history. Fast forward today, and another rivalry is revving up, not on the racetrack but on city streets, as Ford points its crosshairs at Tesla, Inc.

In a tweet about Ford's new hands-free highway driving system, CEO Jim Farley said his automobile company is nothing like Tesla when experimenting with driverless tech using customers as guinea pigs on public roads. Farley tweeted: "BlueCruise! We tested it in the real world, so our customers don't have to."