[VIDEO] It’s the Mustang Mach-E vs the C8 Corvette At the Dragstrip

One of the smartest moves by an automotive publication in recent memory was Edmunds’ decision to flat-out buy their own mid-engine Corvette at the beginning of C8 mania. Now, they have the ability to throw every willing and worthy press car that comes their way in the ring with America’s new sports car (and online content) benchmark; brilliant!

To celebrate the start of 2022, they took their Rapid Blue beauty to a straight portion of Willow Springs Raceway for a date with a shameful marketing exercise called the Ford Mustang Mach-E. If you are lucky enough to have been living in blissful ignorance and that name confuses you, just wait until you see this thing! What the Blue Oval did to create their first honest attempt at an electric car for the masses was sculpt the most anonymous, but popular shape on the road today; a crossover with heavy egg styling influences, and then they sullied their most valuable bit of intellectual property by slapping a running horse on the fake grille and in-between a familiar set of three-bar tail lights on the rear hatch. But, the folks at Edmunds actually aren’t completely off their rocker in pairing this plug-in cute-ute with the Plastic Fantastic on a curve-less stretch of tarmac. The Mach-E that they currently find in their possession is a “GT Performance” model that, at 480 HP, nearly matches the ‘Vette’s power output, but, being powered by batteries, it also makes an impressive 634 lb-ft of instantly-available torque, besting even the LT2 V8 by 164, or 35%. The “Mustang” with no direct relationship to any prior Mustang also clocks in as a relative bargain with an as-tested price of $69,800 to the Stingray’s $80,660 (and good luck getting one for that, even in year three of production!).

Weight is where the Corvette gets itself back into the pre-fight favorite column. The high-riding, four-door ‘Stang tips the scales just three pounds shy of 5,000, while the ‘Vette only brings 3,649 lbs. to the table. The hosts talk for quite a while, and the most interesting tid-bit that they reveal to the audience is that the Mach-E will only give its driver full power for five measly seconds before it starts to hold itself back. Ford did this to fight premature battery degeneration, but in a car with performance intentions, this feature just seems wrong.

The action finally gets underway at the 3:00 mark with “Race One.” We don’t like to spoil the results of these things, so all we will say is that, as expected, the Mach-E is strong off the line and at the 1/8th marker, the cars are uncannily close! The second race is also a traditional quarter mile done from a standstill. It kicks off 4:10 into the video and is followed by a good amount of chitter chatter before a 30 MPH roll race breaks out at 6:56. There is some foul play in this part of the video, but the result is still quite telling. Finally, the video wraps with some instrumented testing and a final verdict.

Source:
Edmunds / YouTube

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