[VIDEO] Sport Auto Takes a C7 Corvette Z06 to 7:13.9 on the Nurburgring

Finally! The C7 Corvette Z06 has an official Nurburgring lap time!

The Corvette Team has had multiple opportunities (we counted three different visits) to set an official time for the C7 Z06 at the Nurburgring. Tadge even announced that there was lapped time with video coming soon in June 2015. But for whatever their reasons, the team has since declined to publish any results.

Thankfully, the German publication Sport Auto, whose known for testing cars on the Nurburgring and Germany’s autobahn, finally got their hands on C7 Corvette Z06 armed with the Z07 Performance Package, Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2s and a seven-speed manual gearbox.

Sport Auto’s Christian Gebhardt was the pilot behind the wheel and he had his work cut out for him. The car would run an instrumented lap time of 7:13.9! As a reminder, the C6 2012 Corvette ZR1’s time was 7:19.63 and the Camaro ZL1 1LE’s time was 7:16.04.

As we’ve seen previously like at Car and Driver’s Lighting Lap competition, the Corvette Team’s driving ace Jim Mero is usually a few seconds faster (it is his office, ya know) and so to ask the question, is it theoretical that an official manufacturers time could be somewhere around 7:10? What would the car do with an 8-speed automatic? So many questions!

Check out the full lap video here:

After watching this a couple of times, here’s some observations:

The Z06 being driven has Michigan manufacturer plates, so the car is most likely a test car provided to Sport Auto by General Motors.

At 2:00 the Z06 goes air-born at 277 km/h (172 mph)!

On the back straightway at about 7:10, he is really moving and the top speed shows 285 kh/m (177 mph). For comparison, the Camaro’s top speed in that same segment was 173 mph. Both were beat by the 2012 Corvette ZR1 whose top speed was 183 mph. So if the 2018 ZR1 does have the rumored active aero that could be trimmed for the high speed segments, I think that a sub-7:00 Nurburgring time might just be a possibility.

And I was just reminded of when GM denied a 7:08 Nurburgring time by the Z06.

Your move, Corvette Team!

Source:
roadandtrack.com

Related:
[VIDEO] Fast and Loud! Another Look at the 2018 Corvette ZR1 on the Nurburgring
[VIDEO] Camaro ZL1 ILE Rocks the Nurburgring in 7:16.04
Road & Track: GM Source Says No to 7:08 Nurburgring Lap for the 2015 Corvette Z06