2020 Corvette first drive: America's supercar fighter - Shot in 4K

The mid-engine Corvette is finally here, it's finally in production, and it's finally heading to dealerships across the country, which means I can finally answer all those questions that have been burning in the back of my mind since I saw this on

first

time last year. The biggest generational change the Corvette has ever seen, so I want to know things like if it's still practical enough for daily driving, if it can still hold up to a day of abuse on the track, if it still sounds good, and if it still offers the best Performance for money in the market basically what I want to know is if this is still a Corvette.

The

first

question, of course, is whether it still looks like a Corvette, and to be honest, that's a bit debatable. I'm going. Going out on a limb and saying that even without the badges, most people could pick this out of a lineup like Corvette, but it's still certainly a radical departure from what came before and that overall profile is much more exotic than the C7 or any previous generation. Corvette, in fact, the nose is much shorter in the tail, a little longer as expected, but the biggest visual change is actually those huge air intakes just after the doors that keep the 6.2-liter V8 cooled.

The new LT 2 is, of course, the heart. of the beast now fully on display in its new location closer to the center of the car, the new engine makes more power than before up to 490 horsepower from 455 last year and 465 pound-feet of torque from 455, but opted for the high performance exhaust. that we have here and you're looking at a slightly tastier 495 horsepower, not to mention a sub-3-second 0-60 time plus a much earlier exhaust note. Chevrolet has done a great job of packaging here and still keeps the removable Corvette branding. Targa roof and gives you room in the trunk to store it, but this is the latest generation car, you could still fit some bags and the roof in the rear hatch in the new Corvette.

It is almost certainly not possible, it is good that there is a front. This time around, from an overall aesthetic standpoint, the Corvette definitely catches the eye, but I have to say it's a little too busy for me with too many complicated lines and styling cues, the problem extending to the interior I've been in. I'm lucky enough to

drive

every generation of Corvette, yes, even the C1 with its scary brakes and three foot wide steering wheel and of course this feels like a spaceship compared to that, but even compared to the C7, the previous generation Corvette, this feels radically different.

The first thing is that it feels a lot more retractable than before and I think part of that is because I have a peanut glass back here where before, of course, I had an open cargo compartment, but also the way that the design of The cabin is designed to really highlight the

drive

r and really feel like I'm stuck in here, which is great as long as you're the driver, if you're the passenger, you're out of luck; A lot of the controls for the HVAC, for example, are along this kind of row of silly looking buttons that run all the way to the right side, everything from the temperature to the fan speed, look here at the controls, they're all here, they're all here.

They are facing me, which is good as a driver, but if you are the passenger and want to change the temperature, it may be a little difficult to do so because the navigation system is also facing me. I also have buttons scattered everywhere on this ridiculous row and the other right. The HUD controls are on the bottom left, everything is a little more spread out and I don't really like that, but I do like the seating position. I feel like I'm sitting low. I feel like I'm in the middle. of the car, which is great and ultimately a really attractive place to be, but probably the biggest step up from the C7's materials, everything here looks and feels fantastic thanks to the Alcantara on the steering wheel.

I have a lot of carbon fiber trim. "Of different things, even the plastics feel like they are on a different level compared to what we had in the last generation Corvette and that definitely makes it feel like a much more premium car, maybe even like a European car with a mid-engine at the moment. We've been working mostly around the speed limit because we're on the roads and we've been in Tour mode, which is a more comfortable way to drive this car. Here we have the optional LT 3 package and the z51 performance package. this car means we have a very comfortable driving mode at the moment the brakes have also been modularized to be a little easier to modulate the steering is nice and light and that new 8 speed dual clutch transmission which is the only one Now, the transmission basically feels like an automatic, but with the twist of a knob and a little patience, it takes about three seconds to change modes.

The annoying thing is that you can go from sport mode and then to track mode and then the fun begins. We are now at the race track at the CH, which is in track mode at Spring Mountain, which is about an hour from Las Vegas. This is a really great facility, a perfectly nice place to put this through its paces in track mode, it feels like. like a completely different car, of course, we're going to feel it because the magnetorheological suspension can adjust and adapt dynamically based on what you're doing and what I'm doing now is pushing it, to say the least, the transmission, of course, can adjust also get that HP DCT which has super quick shifts, they get much more aggressive here.

I'm using manual mode right now and I probably don't need to be a little more fun that way. Jeremiah says she wired these chips. panels directly to the traffic transmission to give you more responsive shifting basically in Aeneas form and I have to say I don't know if that's marketing nonsense or what but it hurts every time you touch this paddle you immediately get into gear no lag no There is a delay and this will keep it going completely until revlon. You can bounce on the rev limiter whenever you want. This thing will not automatically increase the chips.

That's pretty good. The steering also has a little more weight. Honestly, I don't like it if we're going to create my custom driving mode, which you can do. I'd reduce it to the more touring-oriented and less steering-oriented mode, but perhaps the most interesting thing about the C8 is that the brake pressure changes. Depending on what mode you're in, this basically has a brick by wire system, they call it eBoost, similar to what's fine in the NSX and a couple of others don't let new cars on the road right now, so which means that basically what I feel when I press the left pedal with my left foot is an almost completely synthetic feeling, so while I'm running and spinning here in the desert, if it were a hot day for example, I wouldn't really feel any fading of the brakes.

The car would be more, let's take care of it and give me a really strong and consistent pedal feel, lap after lap, it hums on the first lap and that's a good thing, yeah, okay, it disconnects me from the car a little bit more if I was worried. The brakes overheating, it would be a little less responsive for me, but in a short period like we're doing today, just a couple of laughs, it means it's a nice consistent response all the time, but it also means I'll go out to road. you have an easier to modulate brake pedal, that's a good thing, so it all depends on how the car adapts to track mode, the track feels, but it's really good, the car will understeer, the car will oversteer, basically, this will do what you want. to do and that's really what you want, it feels great, neutrally balanced and really aggressive, the steering feedback is really strong.

I feel like as soon as I make any steering input the Amelie car reacts and that's because I'm sitting 16. 1/2 inches further forward than the last generation Corvette which means as soon as I turn the steering wheel I'm sorry because I'm a little bit closer to that moment, that turning radius and it's a little bit closer to my hip. So while this is a bigger, heavier car than last year at the track and it means I can put a little more effort in the butt, this Spring Mountain circuit has a series of long left and right turns that if you were driving a car normal with a The normal oil pan sitting under the oil sloshing back and forth as you go from left to right at night poses some starvation problems, but is a great test for understeer for the first time.

The cool thing is what was here, although it's a big test for the new one. dry sump system they have on the new v8 this year. Chevrolet engineers tell me that the Corvette will maintain 1.25 G laterally without oil starvation issues, which is pretty remarkable because it's not likely to last very long on average from this. At the racetrack they also say that this e51 package that has some extra cooling is good enough to basically do as long a pull session as you want at 100 degrees Fahrenheit without the car overheating, they said you could put a full tank in of gas around here at a hundred degrees a day or the car would never overheat and that's why the air conditioning on is pretty impressive.

I can't prove that it's actually closer to 50 degrees today, in fact I have the heat on today, but if you live somewhere you like this and want to do this kind of thing in the summer, that's good to know and also It's very encouraging if maybe you've heard some interesting topics in the news, like terrorism prevention, what about this cabin that felt a little claustrophobic? here on the street it feels very good. I have good reinforcement for my knees so I can lean against the side of the car and there's enough padding so I don't get bruises on my knees, which can be a problem when you're going through courses as technical as this, the car certainly It sounds much better here and people think that a mid-engine car must necessarily sound better than a front-engine car, as a mid-engine car owner.

Don't get too excited, it's just a mr2. I can tell you that's not always the case, in fact, just idling around town in the C8 Corvette before the effect is more like a sewing machine than a big V8 because really what you're doing. I'm hearing a lot of valve noise here at the track in track mode with the sport exhaust wide open and I missed my 20 by about a mile, maybe I'll ponder it now, this track has changed a lot since last time. I've been here, it's growing a lot, this whole facility is growing a lot, so I'm not very familiar with this track, it's pretty complicated, but I feel like I can go out here and attack right away and feel very comfortable in this car.

Think it's a shitty sponsorship on the road, the new Corvette is as comfortable and practical as ever and thanks to the new transmission you don't have to choose between the comfort of an automatic and the performance of a manual you get the best of both worlds, That's doubly true here on the race track, where this thing is an absolute demon, so is it still the performance bargain it never was? Is it still a Corvette? The answer is a resounding yes, that is. What I think of a new Corvette, but we want to know what you think, let us know in the comments, share, subscribe and watch the road show calmly for all the details.