MR Corvette C8 - General Discussion

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That’s why I feel high prices for the Corvette are justified. Now that it’s a global car, I see a good few where live, Chevrolet probably does have to shed its bargain basement price tag.

Not to go too far on a tangent as I usually do, when Hyundai decided to not want to be known as having a car for sale under $20,000AUD, their products were more upscale in quality and performance. Relating that to Chevrolet, just the redesign of the dashboard & console alone shows they’re listening and acting to make the product better. Definitely adds value in my eyes. Even if the C8 isn’t my cup of tea.
 
McLaren
Eh, some could argue it should be one of Corvette's priorities. The fact you can still get a near 700Hp Corvette for just around $110,000 just like 15 years ago is commendable, but the market has also caught up, pumping out similar value for power; I think a few years ago, a GT500 was offering 750Hp for $80,000, granted it lacked the track performance of a 'Vette. So, much of the Corvette's charm at delivering bang for the buck performance isn't there anymore now that all 3 American manufacturers can deliver it.

It also kind of stinks that although the ZR1 is still undercutting the top European sports cars with more power for less money, at $175,000, it feels like it's growing to have more in common with the exotic market and less with the idea of a Corvette. At $130,000, they were able to deliver just under 3,000 C7 ZR1s in 1 MY (which is not bad compared to the C6's), so I'm very curious to see how many ZR1/Xs get built at that price point given GM already seems to acknowledge it will be a limited production in some capacity.
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Ah, but you're forgetting the ZR-1 Dark Omen

1970-1972 ZR1 (C3)
1973 Oil Crisis and the beginning of a decade of crippled economic growth

1990-1996 ZR1 (C4)
2000 Dotcom crash

2009-2013 ZR1 (C6 - released in 2008 as a 2009 model)
2008-2012 Great Financial Crisis

2019 ZR1 (C7)
2020 COVID pandemic

Ok so the C4 model was a litttttle removed from global catastrophe, but every other ZR1 has immediately preceded one. Things aren't looking too sunny out there now....
 
Eunos_Cosmo
Ah, but you're forgetting the ZR-1 Dark Omen

Ok so the C4 model was a litttttle removed from global catastrophe, but every other ZR1 has immediately preceded one. Things aren't looking too sunny out there now....
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Zionists and Revolutionaries -1 Xplosion.
 
I love the fact it's got more or less the equivalent of a 911 GT2RS in power advantage over a 992 GT3 RS and somehow... it's still slower than both of them.
 
Well, it accomplished what the GTD couldn't by beating the GT3 RS by... only .053 seconds?
Come On Lol GIF by EsZ Giphy World
 
Drew Cattell is the one who set the lap, and apparently his job title is a vehicle dynamics engineer. I’ve found some results that might indicate he’s an amateur racer, but nothing more attached to the name.

Why GM didn’t put one of their factory drivers from the Hypercar or GT3 program into the car for this lap is beyond me, but the car might have gone faster if they had done so.
 
All three times set in the three cars were all set by engineers. I think this is just a form of sandbagging, because they can definitely go way faster

www.motor1.com

Mission Accomplished: The Corvette ZR1X Broke Ford's Nürburgring Record

Both the ZR1 and ZR1X beat the Ford Mustang GTD around the Green Hell, making it the quickest American car around the Nordschleife. The ZR1X even knocked the Porsche 911 GT3 RS down a peg.
www.motor1.com www.motor1.com

Both the ZR1 and ZR1X beat the Ford Mustang GTD’s 6:52.072. The ZR1 managed a 6:50.763 while the hybrid ZR1X shaved that time down to 6:49.275, even beating out the Porsche 911 GT3 RS. Meanwhile, the Z06 set a very respectable 7:11.826.

Corvette ZR1X — 6:49.275
Corvette ZR1 — 6:50.763
Corvette Z06 — 7:11.826

All three Corvettes were stock production cars except for some safety modifications—a roll hoop, a bucket seat, a six-point harness, and a fire-suppression system. Each featured its respective optional performance package and Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 R tires. The Nürburgring officially considers these prototype cars, however, as the Z06 was a US-spec model, and the ZR1 and ZR1X aren’t sold in Europe.

The lap times were set by Corvette engineers, not professional race-car drivers, a fact that Chevy is proud of. Vehicle performance manager Aaron Link set the time in the Z06, vehicle dynamics engineer Brian Wallace set the time in the ZR1, and fellow vehicle dynamics engineer Drew Cattell set the time in the ZR1X.
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Then just stick a pro driver in, because it's not a good look for a 1250 hp car to be a tenth faster than a 520hp car...
 
MisterWaffles
Drew Cattell is the one who set the lap, and apparently his job title is a vehicle dynamics engineer. I’ve found some results that might indicate he’s an amateur racer, but nothing more attached to the name.

Why GM didn’t put one of their factory drivers from the Hypercar or GT3 program into the car for this lap is beyond me, but the car might have gone faster if they had done so.
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What's a bit funny is just popping off to see what Corvette owners think, there's a few using the engineers as GM "purposefully" doing so to prove the car is much faster. But, according to Jalopnik, GM's engineers aren't exactly scrubs, either.
That said, with an estimated 600 laps under his belt, Cattell isn't exactly new to this whole "lapping the Nürburgring" thing. Meanwhile, ZR1 vehicle dynamics engineer Brian Wallace, who set the fastest lap in the regular ZR1, has been around the 'Ring an estimated 425 times. And yet, vehicle performance manager Aaron Link, who piloted the Corvette Z06, reportedly beats them both with roughly 800 laps under his belt. Now that's a lot of laps.
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I'm not confident it would make a ton of difference anyway besides maybe leap frogging the Black Series. GM's engineer piloted the Z06 to a 7:11.826 in June this year, whilst Sport Auto used Christian Gebhardt in December of last year who managed 7:10.52. For comparison using Mercedes, Christian accomplished 7:06.60 in the GT R Pro whilst Mercedes' driver, Maro, accomplished 7:04.632. In the Black Series, Christian set a 6:52.54 vs. Maro's record setting 6:48.047, so a 4.5 second gap that's nothing to sneeze at, but that GT2 RS is a solid 6 seconds faster. Dirk Mueller still came just short of finding that for the GTD, a professional in a street legal race car.

If a professional can extract way more time out of it, then that's the route GM should've gone, as Fred said. Put this thing up there or past the GT2 RS (since even Corvette owners knew there was no shot it was touching the One) instead of sitting just fractionally faster than the GT3 RS & a second behind the 5 year old Black Series. That's 1250Hp to slot in between 520Hp & 720Hp.

Edit* This is from Aaron Link speaking very highly of GM's engineers when talking about the ZR1 setting lap records across the US & how the lap times they set are a testament to GM's training & certification.
We’re all pretty accomplished and have proven that over the years. It would have been very difficult to choose only one person who would have the honor to do this, so four drivers for four venues felt perfect.
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The capability we collectively demonstrated speaks volumes to our driver training and certification program,” he says. “We’ve cultivated this group of people, and it grows every year. We’re always finding new people that have the aspirations and the talent to keep this going. It’s the ultimate proof case for the GM driver certification process being second to none.”
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GM set that time the way they did to publicly pants Ford. I'm certainly willing to give them a lot more leeway in that regard when they didn't also run their mouth about it for a year. Leading off with (and thus making most blogs and sites only reporting that) the time of the Dumbass Name is the main mistake, because the regular ZR-1 also doing it is the real story.
 
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McLaren
What's a bit funny is just popping off to see what Corvette owners think, there's a few using the engineers as GM "purposefully" doing so to prove the car is much faster. But, according to Jalopnik, GM's engineers aren't exactly scrubs, either.


I'm not confident it would make a ton of difference anyway besides maybe leap frogging the Black Series. GM's engineer piloted the Z06 to a 7:11.826 in June this year, whilst Sport Auto used Christian Gebhardt in December of last year who managed 7:10.52. For comparison using Mercedes, Christian accomplished 7:06.60 in the GT R Pro whilst Mercedes' driver, Maro, accomplished 7:04.632. In the Black Series, Christian set a 6:52.54 vs. Maro's record setting 6:48.047, so a 4.5 second gap that's nothing to sneeze at, but that GT2 RS is a solid 6 seconds faster. Dirk Mueller still came just short of finding that for the GTD, a professional in a street legal race car.

If a professional can extract way more time out of it, then that's the route GM should've gone, as Fred said. Put this thing up there or past the GT2 RS (since even Corvette owners knew there was no shot it was touching the One) instead of sitting just fractionally faster than the GT3 RS & a second behind the 5 year old Black Series. That's 1250Hp to slot in between 520Hp & 720Hp.

Edit* This is from Aaron Link speaking very highly of GM's engineers when talking about the ZR1 setting lap records across the US & how the lap times they set are a testament to GM's training & certification.
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I'm willing to give GM credit here where I didn't Ford because the ZR-1 is actually cheaper than the GT3/GT2RS & Black Series (not to mention a LOT cheaper than the GTD) and there was no extended marketing effort to make Nürburgring times and beating Porsche the entire identity of the car.
 

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