Pictured at the Famoso Dragstrip, the orange-painted Corvette in the featured clip is mostly stock. The only non-factory items on it are sticky drag radials on the rear wheels. The Michelin Cup 2 R ZP tires of the Z07 performance package are superb in their own right, but alas, they pale in comparison to a set of drag radials.
Owned by United States Navy Reserve officer and American professional stock car racing driver Jesse Iwuji, chassis number 34 is a non-Z07 car with a black-painted removable top. Specified with spider-design forged wheels, the mid-engine land missile recorded 10.443 seconds in the quarter mile, topping 134.23 miles per hour (216 kilometers per hour) on the finish line.
Iwuji notes that it’s hard to launch the Z06 properly. It depends on a variety of aspects, including the rear tires, outside temperature, and track prep, just to name a few. For his run, Iwuji set up the launch RPMs at 5k, and simply kept his right foot planted on the loud pedal until the finish line. At 55 degrees F (12 degrees C), clocking 10.4s with nothing more than DRs is seriously good.
Iwuji further notes that it’s a record pass for the stock Z06, although those drag radials aren’t stock. Chevrolet advertises 10.6 seconds in the quarter mile with the Z07 performance package, including rollout, in perfect conditions. Emelia Hartford crushed the manufacturer’s claim with a Z07-equipped Z06 in 10.51 seconds at 130.11 miles per hour (209.40 kilometers per hour).
Arguably the most radical Z06 in the history of this nameplate, the eighth-generation Corvette Z06 is the first to feature a flat-plane crankshaft V8. Inspired by and benchmarked against the 4.5-liter F136 F of the Ferrari 458 Italia, the 5.5-liter LT6 is the largest flat-plane crankshaft V8 to have made it into series production.
It’s also the most powerful naturally-aspirated production V8, dethroning the 6.2-liter M159 in the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Black Series. It makes 670 horsepower at a screaming 8,400 revolutions per minute, and given its displacement, torque is down on the 6.2-liter LT2 small block of the Stingray. The base ‘Vette produces 470 pound-feet (637 Nm) as opposed to 460 pound-feet (624 Nm) for the Z06 and 468 pound-feet (635 Nm) for the limited-run, gullwing-doored Merc.
Designed to handle rather than blitz the strip, the Z06 uses a dual-clutch transmission just like the Stingray, although modified specifically for this application. Wider than the Stingray, the Z06 is limited to 10 percent of total C8 production output for the 2023 model year.
Priced at $105,300 sans destination charge, the Z06 is heavily influenced by the C8.R endurance racecar that won the IMSA SportsCar Championship twice on the trot in 2020 and 2021. Starting with the 2024 edition of the Rolex 24 at Daytona, the Z06 GT3.R will replace it in the heavily contested GT Daytona Pro category.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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