Category: Corvette Racers

Bench Racing with John Greenwood, Free PDF Booklet & Video

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Inside the Mind of John Greenwood

Dateline: 10.8.21  To download the free PDF, CLICK HERE. NOTE: When your PDF Reader opens, change the “View” setting to 100% to more easily read the article pages. 

John Greenwood is a legend in the world of Corvettes. Through the ’70s, while production Corvettes struggled to maintain as much performance as possible, John and his brother Burt built a series of stunning C3 Corvette race cars. Arguably, the most famous of the Greenwood Brothers Corvettes was their famous “Batmobile” very wide-body Corvette that was more aerodynamic and produced lots of down-force on the car’s huge racing slicks. Greenwood needed as much traction as he could get to better work his ZL-1 427 engines, rumored to be making upwards of 700-hp, perhaps more. Continue reading “Bench Racing with John Greenwood, Free PDF Booklet & Video” →

Take a Few Laps around Daytona in a ’56/’57 Corvette – 2 Videos

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Watch some old school fun in this ride-along video from the passenger-side seat of this racing 1956/1957 Corvette.

Dateline: 11.13.18 – Corvette racecars from the 1950s look absolutely prehistoric from our modern perspective. They were 100-percent mechanical beasts. This video beautifully captures the sights and sounds of this old world racing Corvette.

Back in the day, just like today, Corvettes had plenty of grunt and only needed improved suspension and brakes. That’s what Chevy’s RPO racing parts program was all about. Chevrolet general manager, Ed Cole, charged engineers Zora Arkus-Duntov and three-time Indy 500 winner Mauri Rose, with running the program.

Duntov oversaw the engineering in Detroit and tested the special parts at the GM Proving Ground, and Rose was the field engineer that worked with Smokey Yunick and various racers to field test and improve the parts. By the end of the 1959s, Corvettes were winning championships and were beginning to dominate.

Just for some contrast, I’ve included an in-car video from one of the C7.R Corvettes. Here’s Tommy Milner in the C7.R at Daytona in 2014.

WOW! What a contrast! Enjoy! – Scott

 

COME ON! Take a Ride in a 1977 Greenwood Wide-Body Corvette at Daytona! – VIDEO

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Ride along with Didier Andre in the Spirit of America 1977 Greenwood Corvette

This is as viscous as it gets Corvette fans!

Oh, the sound of a big-block Chevy engine with open headers working through the gears.

And here’s the view from the outside!

Turn it up LOUD, hear and feel the POWER! We love LOUD Corvettes!- Scott

PS – The digital speedometer is in kelometers-per-hour. The car gets up to around 180-mph.

Corvette Timeline Tales: March 24, 1956 – Chevrolet Scores First Major Road Racing Win with a Team of Heavily-modified Corvettes – VIDEOS

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Image: GM Archives

Unlike today’s out in the open Corvette Racing Team, in 1956 John Fitch’s factory-supported racing team was strictly a covert-op!

Dateline: 3.24.18 – Photos: GM Archives & Mecum Auctions – In the early days and well into the early 1980s GM and Chevrolet had an odd attitude about Corvette racing. There never was a lack of enthusiasm from Corvette engineers and designers, but the company just wouldn’t make “racing” official, in the same way Ford and Chrysler did for their racing programs, that got them tons of publicity and street cred.

But make no doubt about it, in 1956 there was indeed a factory Corvette racing effort, and it paid off! Four Corvettes were specially prepared for the 12 Hours of Sebring race on March 24, 1956, under the official banner of Dick Doane’s Raceway Enterprises. These were no ordinary production Corvettes. WW-II fighter pilot and racing champion, John Fitch was the team manager and had the full support and assistance of Ed Cole and Zora Arkus-Duntov.

Photos by David Newhardt, courtesy Mecum Auctions.

After a successful performance at Daytona Beach in February 1956 where three of Duntov’s specially-prepared Corvettes set speed records on the Daytona beach sand, the three cars were sent back to Michigan to be prepared for the Sebring assault and one more car was added to the team. Continue reading “

Corvette Timeline Tales: March 24, 1956 – Chevrolet Scores First Major Road Racing Win with a Team of Heavily-modified Corvettes – VIDEOS” →

The History of Mid-Engine Corvettes, 1960 to C8: Part 3

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The 1964 AWD CERV II – Duntov’s planned Ford GT40-Killer and Le Mans Champion.Dateline: 11.23.17 – For decades the topic of a mid-engine Corvette was simply “pie in the sky.” It was a fanciful piece of Corvette lore going back to the early days when Zora Arkus-Duntov was driving the Corvette brand. Every so many years, the topic would resurface, so when I heard it again for the umpteenth time, just after the C7 arrived, I said, “Oh, sure…”  But, it’s going to happen, finally! The mid-engine C8 Corvette will make its grand debut at the 2018 North American International Auto Show in Detroit as a 2019 model.
In the interest of explaining how we got to where we are with the whole, long, mid-engine Corvette story, lets buckle into the Corvette Report Time Machine, set the dials (yes, we still use “dials” here at Corvette Report) and go back to 1963/1964 when that wiley, silver-haired Russian fox, Zora Arkus-Duntov tried once again, to build a “Corvette” to race at Le Mans.  Indulge me while I bench race a little here, Continue reading “

The History of Mid-Engine Corvettes, 1960 to C8: Part 3″ →

Corvette Timeline Tales: Corvette Racecars ROMP Daytona 200 GTO Class!

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November 21, 1971: IMSA’s first Daytona 200 race and Corvettes ROMP the GTO class!

Dateline: 11.21.17 – We’re not sure how often this has happened, but “not often” is a safe bet. This was the inaugural season of IMSA’s GT Championship racing series. The cars were Grand Tour-style racecars that ran in the GTU and GTO classes. “GTU” class was for cars with engines under 2.5-liters and “GTO” class was for cars with engines over 2.5-liters. At the end of the 200-mile race, Don Yenko and Dave Heinz came in 1st overall and 1st in the GTO class, followed by SEVEN other Corvettes!
 
It was a banner season for Corvettes and Chevrolet in IMSA GTO racing in 1971 with Chevrolet winning the Constructor’s Championship for the year with 51 points and Shelby way back in 2nd place with 13 points.

Here’s how the cars crossed the finish line:

1st in GTO class and 1st overall is the Toye English #57 1969 Corvette L-88 driven by Dave Heinz and Don Yenko. Continue reading “

Corvette Timeline Tales: Corvette Racecars ROMP Daytona 200 GTO Class!” →

Z06 Corvette History, Pt 1 – The 1963 Z06 Racer Kit

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“For “Off Road” Use Only” was Chevy Code for RACING!

Dateline: 8.12.17 / Photos: WikiCommons, Illustrations by K. Scott Teeters – When I was a wee lad and would see the term, “For Off Road Use Only” I used to think, “Well who drives these cars in the dirt and grass?” What I didn’t understand was that the term is code for “RACING”! Beginning in 1957, Chevrolet’s new general manager, Ed Cole, made the command decision that he would let “customers” carry the Corvette racing mantle by offering Chevrolet-engineered parts, specifically designed for racing, available through the Chevrolet Parts Department.

For decades, Zora Arkus-Duntov has been credited for the implementation of the Corvette “Racer Kits” through the RPO (Regular Production Option) system. Zora was the face of the unofficial Corvette racing effort, but while researching C1 Corvette chassis design, I came across some interesting information in Karl Ludvigsen’s 2014 book, “CORVETTE: America’s Star Spangled Sports Car”. While Duntov was definitely the front man, Ed Cole also charged three-time Indy 500 winner and engineer, Mauri Rose with the development of the Corvette’s RPO parts program. So, the Corvette “Off Road” RPO effort guided by Le Mans racer and class winner, Duntov, AND Mauri Rose, the second man to win the Indy 500 three times (1941, 1947, and 1948)! Pretty cool, huh?

The Racer Kits weren’t a “secret” but unless customers were tuned into racing, most weren’t aware of this special program. In truth, since improvements in suspension and brakes were for racing, customers rarely used them for their street Corvettes. And typically racers used the expensive dual quad or Fuel Injection performance engines. The Racer Kit RPO option program enabled Corvette racers to be seriously competitive in SCCA racing such that by the end of the 1950s, Corvettes were a force to be reckoned with.

Engineer Maurice Olley designed the chassis and suspension of the first Corvette in 1952 and was considered to be the best suspension and chassis engineer in Detroit. It is essential to remember that the Corvette was NOT designed to be a racecar. Continue reading “

Z06 Corvette History, Pt 1 – The 1963 Z06 Racer Kit” →

George Haddad’s Factory-Style 1969 427 ZL-1 Corvette

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George Haddad’s Stunning 1969 ZL-1 427 Corvette – With some personal touches!

Dateline: 7.6.17 (VIDEOS AT THE BOTTOM!)  (This story was first published in the January 2016 issue of Vette Vues Magazine).

To understand the importance and uniqueness of George Haddad’s 1969 ZL-1 Corvette, we have to get into the “Vette Vues Time Machine” and go back to late 1968. The December 1968 issue of Hot Rod Magazine hit the newsstands like a thunder clap, with an obviously all-aluminum big-block 427 Corvette engine wearing bright yellow tube headers. It looked like Chevrolet finally had an ace trump card. The 427 ZL-1 was the ultimate “pie-in-the-sky” Corvette setup – big-block horsepower and torque – with the weight of an iron small-block! Duntov was a happy man because his dream of an all-aluminum engine for the Corvette went all the way back to the 1957 Q-Corvette concept that not only called for a fuel-injected all-aluminum small-block engine, but a trans-axle! (Sounds like a C5, doesn’t it?)

Duntov and his team tried casting SBC engines in aluminum, but there was a serious “strength of materials” issue that was never successfully worked out. The SBC was simply not strong enough when made in aluminum. A small batch of all-aluminum 377 engines were developed for the Grand Sport project that were powerful and light, but just wouldn’t hold together in competition. The prospect of an engine lighter than a regular SBC was deliciously tantalizing. So when the replacement for the 348/409/427 W-series (truck) engine, (the Mark IV) was being designed, an aluminum version was an obvious next step because the Mark IV was inherently a more stout structure.
The story of the production ZL-1 Corvettes is a long and complex one that we won’t try unraveling here, except to say that a batch of seven cars were built in early September 1969. The cars that “rolled off the St. Louis assembly line” were full-out RPO-L88 cars. The RPO-ZL-1 aluminum block was an option that was only available on an L88 engine. In other words, the ZL-1 was identical to the L88, except it had an aluminum block – making it 100-pounds lighter than the L88 Corvette, something that only racers would even notice. Continue reading “

George Haddad’s Factory-Style 1969 427 ZL-1 Corvette” →

Morrison 1990 ZR-1 Speed Record: Aver 24-Hour 174.885-MPH! – VIDEO

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Race-prepared, stock 1990 ZR-1 Shatters a 50 Year 24-Hour Speed Record

Illustration by: K. Scott Teeters

Dateline: 5.22.17 (This story first appeared in the May 2017 issue of “Vette Vues”) – Racing Corvettes used to have a long history of durability issues. There are many reasons why Corvette racecars had durability issues, but one of the biggest is easy horsepower. It’s always been relatively easy to get a lot of power out of a small-block or big-block Chevrolet engine. If a builder is more oriented towards drag racing, the temptation for an extra 50-horsepower is just too tempting for many builders. That’s fine for drag racing where a car is stressed to the max for a matter a seconds. But in endurance racing, you have to finish to win.

From the perspective of the mid-1980s, the new C4 Corvette was light years ahead of the previous two-generation Corvettes. In the mid-1980s Corvettes were so fierce in SCCA Showroom Stock racing that after two years they were kicked out for being too fast! So, the factory-built Corvette racecars duked it out in their own series, The Corvette Challenge. Breakage with the C4 cars wasn’t much of an issue thanks to the much-improved structure and suspension, plus the cars weren’t powered by massive, torque-monster big-blocks. Continue reading “

Morrison 1990 ZR-1 Speed Record: Aver 24-Hour 174.885-MPH! – VIDEO” →

Corvette confirms 2016 Le Mans driver line-ups

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lemans-24-hours-of-le-mans-2015-63-corvette-racing-corvette-c7-r-jan-magnussen-antonio-gar

by Jamie Klein as republished from MotorSport.com
Corvette Racing has confirmed its driver line-ups for next June’s Le Mans 24 Hours

Dateline 11.22.16: Ricky Taylor joins the American team for the 2016 edition of the French endurance classic. Taylor makes his return to Le Mans after a year’s absence alongside Antonio Garcia and Jan Magnussen, effectively replacing Ford-bound Ryan Briscoe. Continue reading “

Corvette confirms 2016 Le Mans driver line-ups” →

IMSA: Fassler, Rockenfeller join Corvette Racing for enduros

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imsa

by Corvette Racing (source) as republished from racer.com
More Corvette Racing Talent

Dateline 11.18.15: Already one of endurance sports car racing’s most prominent teams, Corvette Racing is adding even more championship-winning talent to its roster for the first two rounds of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. Marcel Fassler and Mike Rockenfeller will complete the team’s lineup for the Rolex 24 At Daytona and Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring in the pair of Chevrolet Corvette C7.R racecars. Continue reading “

IMSA: Fassler, Rockenfeller join Corvette Racing for enduros” →

‘El General’ C7 Corvette Crashes, Eric Dillard Unharmed & 3.56 Sec Video

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C7-Corvette-El-General-Dragster-720x340

by Sean Szymkowsi as republished from GMAuthority

Pro Line Racing’s Eric Dillard walked away from a crash during a private practice session, according to DragZine.

The accident occurred at Virginia Motorsports Park in General Racing’s latest “El General” C7 Corvette dragster. Earlier in the day, Dillard managed to wrestle out a 3.56-second pass at 224 mph in the C7 Corvette dragster. According to the report, that time makes for one of the fastest times ever posted by a door slammer. Continue reading “

‘El General’ C7 Corvette Crashes, Eric Dillard Unharmed & 3.56 Sec Video” →