Corvette ZO6's "race-bred" performance claim is not an idle one. The model benefits from a 50-year heritage of Corvette competition and a recent extraordinary run of success, including three straight GT1 class wins in the past three Le Mans 24-Hour races.

Since 1999, when the General Motors team officially returned to the track, the Corvette C5.R and C6.R have contested 77 major international races and taken 51 wins - a success ratio of 66 percent.

Corvette first went racing in 1956 - three years after the car's introduction - when John Fitch entered the Sebring 12-Hour, according to Race Magazine.

GM was mostly reluctant to be involved and while private team owners including Briggs Cunningham, Roger Penske and Reeves Callaway continued to race Corvettes, it would be 30 years before GM itself entered the fray again.

The C5.R debuted in 1999 after two years of development and by 2001 was dominating against the likes of the Saleen Ford, Ferrari 550 Maranello and Dodge Viper. It won outright the Daytona 24-Hour with Dale Earnhardt Senior and Junior driving, then went to Le Mans in June for the first of two straight 1-2 class victories.

The C6.R hit the track in 2005 and continued the pattern - nine wins from 10 starts in the American Le Mans Series and the first of two more consecutive Le Mans class wins.

For five straight seasons - 2002 to 2006 - Corvette has carried drivers to the American Le Mans Series championship, demonstrating beyond question that the roadgoing Corvette Z06 is able to boast peerless competition genes.

Further information

Nick Vandenberg
General Manager
Corvette Queensland
Cnr Bruce Highway & Hall Road
Gympie, Q 4570
Phone (07) 5482 7833
Fax (07) 5482 8562
Mob. 0407 010 451
nickv@corvette.com.au