This may be a bit "off topic," but I thought the readers of this forum might be interested in a first hand opinion of the new C6 Corvette. Two months ago,I suggested to my son that we enter Brock Yates' One Lap of America this year.We had planned to take my '04 Superformance Peter Brock designed Daytona Coupe.During a tune and test day at Va. Int. Raceway a month before the OLA was due to start,I blew a rod through the oil pan,so the Coupe was out.My son volunteered his 2 month old C6, stock with the Z51 performance package[suspension and brake upgrades] and a Corsa exhaust.The car had around 1000 miles and had not been put on a track. The One Lap of America is an annual endurance drive and track race fashioned after the Cannonball Run.Competitors drive between different road courses and have one recon lap followed by three timed laps in the A.M. and P.M.before heading off to the next venue.A drag race with bracket racing is also held during the 7 day event.We started in South Bend with a wet skid pad,went to Indy Raceway Park,Beaverun,Lancaster for an oval,New Hampshire,Summit Point,Va.Int.Raceway,Roebling Road,Nelson Ledges,and back to South Bend for a dry skid pad.Points are awarded for the total times at the road courses and cars are classified as to cost,HP,and year of manufacture.We drove a total of around 3600 miles in the 7 days. My son and I are real amatures with regards to road racing.We have been to the 5 Day Bertil Roos Race School-twice myself-done a number of Ferrari Club track weekends in my 550 and the Daytona,and I am racing in the Bertil Roos F2000 series for the second time this year. I have to say that everything which has been written about the C6 is exactly correct.It is simply an amazing car.With 400 HP and 400 lb/ft of torque,it has-for us-more than enough power to do just about anything on a track.We put Porterfield RC 4 pads on the car with Pirelli P Zero tires[have to run street tires and can only use one set for the week.] and did nothing to the car except adjust the tire pressure before and after our track runs.The car handles superbly,rotates well,stops RIGHT NOW,is comfortable to spend 770 miles driving at night between Roebling Road and Nelson Ledges,and gave us no problems except blowing a fuse which knocked out our electrical outlets for the radar detector,cell phones etc before we replaced it.There are some obvious design cues Chevrolet has taken from our Ferraris for the C6-the rear and front lights from the 550 and 575 etc.Because of the lower weight,I think the C6 accelerates quicker than my '02 550 and has much less understeer than the 550 on a track.The only "complaints" I would have are that the steering wheel has less feel than a modern Ferrari and the gear shift throws are quite long. As has been said,it is one of the best bangs for the performance buck on the market today.If the new ZO6 due out later this year has the same degree of improvement over last year's ZO6 as does the C6 over the C5,we will have some serious competition during our track weekends. And for those that might be wondering,we finished 47th out of 93 cars and had the time of our lives!
