The Corvette ZR1 drove around the Nurburgring in 7:26:4 today which officially beats the time set by the 2009 Nissan GT-R. GM development engineer Jim Mero commented on the fact that the after the lap the conditions were good except for a strong headwind down the main straight and that the lap was solid, although he felt like he could have gone faster in a few places. The ZR1 has posted one of the fastest times of any production car.
Last week GM announced the starting price for the 638 horsepower 2009 ZR1 at $103,300.
The ZR1's video has raised quite a few questions about the validity of the track time. There have also been rumors that both automakers Detroit-Auto-Show-2008 (Chevy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet and Nissan) cheated by using racing fuel and other modifications, even though GM claims that the ZR1 was stock.
The guys over at Garage419 created a side by side video to try to answer some questions that have been raised. Both cars start at different points on the track so the Garage419 guys used the pit-exit sign as a visual landmark.
Apparently a time of 7:29 wasn't fast enough around the famed Nurburgring for the Nissan GT-R, so Nissan engineers went to work on the 2010 model to make it even faster.
The engineers returned with a 2010 GT-R which features five extra horsepower, a revised dual-clutch transmission with updated launch control, a bigger fuel tank, retuned suspension and new tires
. The updates were enough to lower the time to an astonishing 7min 27.56 secs.
Nissan claims that the time was posted using a 2010 GT-R with V-spec wheels and tires. The time is still slower than the Chevrolet Corvette ZR1’s 7:26.40.
