2027 Corvette Grand Sport | Faster Than a GT3?

The Corvette Grand Sport has represented the sweet spot in the Corvette lineup since the sixth generation of Corvette. With a starting price of $88,000, the new 535 horsepower C8 generation Grand Sport promises to deliver on that reputation. In this video we set up to see if the Grand Sport lives up to its history by setting a lap time, talking about the all-new LS6 engine, and discussing the details with the engineers behind the car. I don't even have any jokes, dude. Autobahn Country Club South, Mark. Grand Sport Corvette LS6. It says Florid. Yeah. Oh, another Corvette. Jack's like, oh, this is the last one. They said it's the last one, Mark. Oh my god, already? Are you gonna stop? Oh, I think I just leaked. All right. Oh god. So the first thing I'm gonna talk about, Mark, is the LS6. I know you're not a pushrod V8 man like I am, but tell me, tell me what you think of the torques. Yeah, the torque, it's, it's a nice addition. Coming from the Z06 that I have to be punished with all the time from you, you definitely feel it when you're exiting. Yes. It really makes propels this car in a smooth way, and I think because it's naturally aspirated, it all of that wasn't predictable. But what you do notice versus the Z06 is the lack of Vs, but the lack of the top end. Anywhere on this track, any of the big straights, you're somewhere between five and seven miles an hour slower, but I think it's a lot more approachable power band, and you can be so greedy with the throttle in the higher speed corners of this car, or it isn't constantly upsetting it. When it comes to braking, because you're not carrying so much speed, I think despite the lack of some of the communication through the brake pedal, it's easier to have a good idea of what's actually happening while you're driving this car, which I talked to the engineers about this, and I said that because this car has the optimal power to weight ratio, the right amount of torque, the right amount of horsepower for this chassis, and the right amount of tire, they're not running from their electromechanical systems like they do in the ZR1 and ZR1X, where you reach the limit of what they can do by giving you any feel in the brakes. This car doesn't hit those extreme limits, so the brake pedal feel or lack thereof isn't a problem here. It's also not as big of an issue with the steering. You don't feel like you're constantly chasing this car around, so that super light, quick, darty steering doesn't affect me as much here. This car is perfectly optimized for the horsepower here. This is the best Corvette experience I've ever had, and I came into this like, oh god, they're milking this. Here's another Corvette. Jack's promising me they're just milking it. This is by far the best experience driving a Corvette I've ever had, and it's literally, they've perfected the C8 in this car. Yeah, no, no. It's like, because it's a little softer, as you're going to hear from Andrew in the shop, than the Z06, the ride quality is very, very good. The car is less scary than a Z01. Like, in this straight, you'll hit maybe just under 130. With the Z01, you're hitting 148, so everything happens slower, and you can appreciate what they've done. It's also a car that I think they've handled some of the twitchiness the Z06 has, which is one of the reasons I like that car, but it's also sometimes frustrating to drive. Unlike the Z06, it feels less willing to break away under trail braking, so it's just a less nervous-feeling vehicle. Well, you're not, to be fair, we're on the call two hours, and they're pretty used at this point, but this car, you're not chasing the back end. You get to focus more on your driving and your precision of driving. You're doing less guesswork as you're driving this through a corner, and if you want to light up the rears like you're doing, you can force it to oversteer, but the balance of this car is just exceptional. A lot of that has to do with the power. Not that the turbocharged cars have an issue with that, but just so much torque down low. Yeah, it pulls you out, but it doesn't upset the car, right? Like, you're not fighting the power. You can lean into it, or you can lean into it a lot of it, and it's still super stable, and that's why I really like it. And again, you're not up against the wall of the brake limits of this brake setup, the brake-by-wire setup, or the older calibers. Like, I could always want more brake. I would love to try the L-counts on this car, which I know they're not doing, but to me, that's the only thing. I wish there was a little bit more brake, but this is, again, this is one of my, if I was going to buy a Corvette, this is the one I'd buy. Oh man, you just said it, Mark. Now a brief word from the sponsor of this video, OpenTrack. Track days are the very best way for you to enjoy your sports car to their limit, particularly in the parameters of the law. However, they are not without their own risks, and you can make a mistake. You could run into mechanical failures, oil hit sand or coolant on track. You could just run out of talent and put your car into a wall and do thousands of dollars of damage to your vehicle, potentially total it, and do damage to the racetrack that you're also responsible for. And your regular car insurance that you use to drive on the road will not cover you in that case. Thus, OpenTrack. OpenTrack is a track day insurance company. They'll give you that peace of mind. They essentially function as a regular insurance policy. You set what you're looking to insure, the value of the vehicle, what deductible you're looking for, and of course, what kind of policy coverage you want. You want it to be day, event, or the entire year. So with that, let's get back to talking about some Corvettes. I'm here with Andrew Abbott, a chassis controls engineer with the Corvette team. Before we talk about the car, very clearly a 126, which is very, very quick. And if you look at our leaderboard, it is somehow faster than the ZS6, which we're going to talk about where the order of the car sit at MRC. And the testing conditions for this test, the track was very rubbered in, which helped it, but it was very warm. It was like 87 or 80 degrees when Britt ran on sticker tires, the Cup 2R, which is your track package tire. How do you deal with lap times when you're regularly testing? Can you walk us through that? Yeah, there's a lot that goes into it to make sure you have a good lap time. Track conditions are key. So like you said, the track had a lot of on a green track. And we know from our development, when we go on development trips, that from the time we get there to the time we leave, we improve lap time just based on laying down Michelin rubber that works super well with our tire. We didn't get that chance here. It was the rubber that was on the track, but it was rubbered up. I don't want to take away from the lap that you guys had, because you did the same testing conditions that Porsche does and all the other OEMs where the tires are brand new, they're on warmers. Britt, who's driving Jesus, goes out and sets a lap time. So it is really impressive what you've done. But people are going to ask, why the hell is this thing faster than a Z06? And a lot of that, again, is due to the testing conditions, because the max speeds you see in the straights in this are 5 to 10 miles an hour lower than a Z06 and like 20 miles an hour lower than a ZR1. But again, a 126.51, for those who aren't paying attention, this car is $113,000, which is less than half of what a GT3 costs. And basically, in the same ballpark of speed. Yeah, I think the biggest thing that the Grand Sport in general benefits from is it gets the whole evolution of the C8 software development work that was done to improve the ZR1 because it needed it with 1,000 horsepower. And then that was just put into the Grand Sport and it just made the Grand Sport even better from the beginning. So we were able to use a lot of the existing hardware from various wide-body programs and then kind of put that together and then really just go after the electrons and really dial this car in and use all of our learnings to really perfect the Grand Sport in general. Because what levers do you have to pull really? You have the dampers, springs, bushings, wheels, and tires, and the diff, correct? Yep, and then chassis controls, which is for on-brake, anything on-brake, that's open. And the steering cowl definitely is a little bit different than the ZR1. So yeah, everything that's electron based, we can go in and attack. We mentioned the word controls earlier. That's what kind of engineer you are. So walk us through what controls are and then let's walk from the diff to the front of the car. Yeah, so I'm personally responsible on the integration side for brake controls. So ABS, TCS, ESC, and PTM on this car particularly. And so that's kind of the chassis controls that we're talking about. And then there's also the diff and we have a specific diff integrator that works specifically on the diff with a calibrator. But we all cohesively work together. If you touch one thing, something else has to change as well. Yeah, and we're very cognizant of, hey, if we're going to make a diff change, how's that going to impact the car throughout the whole corner? What's that going to change to the brake control on corner entry and PTM on corner exit? So we're in a very, very close working relationship every time we're on track, giving each other feedback, and our ultimate goal is to make the best Corvette possible. And part of that was the first development trip that we had. This car didn't have a 5.56 in it, and a couple of us that got to drive it that first development trip thought that a 5.56 would make the car more engaging and then make fifth gear a lot more usable with this engine. And so as soon as we got home, we engaged the team and everybody was on board. So we had a less aggressive final drive ratio prior to going. Yeah, I had to carry over LT2 final drive ratio. And so then when we got home, sharpened our pencils, ran down all the lines for getting a 5.56 in it, and immediately jumped on it, support from everybody. And we put it in, got it on MRC, and we're like, this was the right decision. And from that moment forward, we moved the direction to the 5.56, and it is definitely a big enabler of engagement and making fifth gear more usable on track. How did you change a complaint we've had, and I know your team has heard it to death from us, is brake feel and brake cal. How has that evolved? Obviously, that's what you've been working on this car with PTM. What did you change? Yeah, so on brakes, we were able to take more advantage of rear brake in this car, on this platform specifically, the Grand Sport. And then so just again, it's an evolution of learning. So we didn't stop and just take Z06, right? We started Z06, evolved into Z01, Z01X, and we were able to take all those learnings and pile that into this car. And we hear that feedback all the time. So we hone in on it, and we really try to go on track and target that stuff to make it better. Because we feel it too, we understand where you guys are coming from sometimes. So we try to go after that and improve the car all around to make it a better experience for everybody. Because we know there's a vast variety of customers that drive this car. How does PTM evolve? Is it more just honing in your new Miu that you have with these tires and your suspension setup? Or how do you change that? Yeah, it's more moving the targets around to complement the LS6. It makes torque in a different way than the ZR1s and then the LT2. So we spent a lot of time just making sure PTM complements the car and the behaviors. And PTM is a really good tool that I think a lot of people don't utilize enough, especially if you're new to the car. There's five different PTM modes, and you can work through that to help the car teach you how to drive in a way of, if you go out in PTM3, you're new to a track, new driver, you can start in a lower PTM and drive. And controls, you might think that they're in your way, but I think the learning way to look at that is, what are these controls doing and why are they coming in? And how can I change my driving maybe to not have them intervene as much? And then you move up to the next PTM level and you have less support, and then you keep going all the way up to PTM Pro that is no corner exit control. You're on your own. You're on your own. And a lot of us, that's where we do a lot of the base chassis. We do all of our base chassis in PTM Pro. I go through all the PTM modes because that's what I'm responsible for. And again, it's designed to help everybody have a better experience. They're not a band-aid because you're tuning around everything off, but they're there to keep you from not putting your $100,000 car in. Yeah, there's people that are timid of PTM because they don't really know what to expect. But on one lap, I talked to a bunch of customers and encouraged them to try. I encouraged them to utilize ABS because as a controls engineer, I'm in ABS on the track all the time. I 100% rely on it intentionally. I can drive in and out of it, and I think the car is just as fast. Obviously, your open-wheel background, your car does not have ABS. Right. So yeah, we're there. It's a safety net at times, but it's also a performance enhancement at times. So you utilize the ABS in big heartbreaking zones. Utilize the PTM if you're new to a track. The tires start to degrade over a tank of fuel, and you want a little bit more support there. That's what PTM is for. It's not meant to be a hindrance to the driving experience. Where does this stack in our lap times? Very clearly, I don't want to take anything away from you, but this was the miracle lap performed by Britt. It is a very, very quick lap time. But at MRC, where does it stack? So you have the Stingray Z51, which is your slowest of your track-capable Corvettes, versus the Stingray and the Z06. Where does this sit in the lap times? Yeah, your lap times will show this is really close to the Z06. So it's about on our internal track MRC, Milford Road Course. The Grand Sport is about five seconds faster than the Stingray, Z51 Stingray, and about two seconds off the pace of a Z06 on real push laps. And then where does the Grand Sport X, which we have not driven yet, sit? Because it's less track-focused, but it does make a lot of power. Yeah, a lot of it is tire-based, and it's just behind the Grand Sport Cup tire car. Obviously, the 01 and 01X are just on another echelon of power. So, suspension tuning. There are three packages for this car. You have a base and the two variants of your, I guess, Z52 performance package. Can you walk me through how that's different than a Stingray? Yeah, so the Stingray, from using that as the base, when you go to the base Grand Sport, which is all-season tire focused around not track-rated because of the tire and the brakes, that's about a 3% ride difference, ride frequency difference, from a Z51. And then when you get to the Z52 Sport Package and Z52 Track Package, that's all the same hard parts between the two, and it's an assault on all the electrons based on tire. And from there, those from a Z51 is about a 40% ride increase on the front and a 15% ride increase on the rear. And those numbers, for reference in a wide-body world, are relatively the same as a base ZR1 and about 3% lower than a Z06. Wow. And then a Z07, of course, Z06 is even stiffer than that. Yeah, that's about 8% higher. Brakes, you did mention that. How are the standard Grand Sport brakes different than the Track Pack cars? So, the iron brake package that you can get on the Z52 Sport Package, it's the same caliper, but this brake package on the base car is a different rotor and different brake pad. It emits lower brake dust, so it keeps your wheels cleaner and just a slightly lower entry cost. It's for someone who doesn't want to track, essentially. Yeah, if you're not interested in tracking, this is a great car. It's all around, you get all the wide-body benefits with just a little bit cheaper, inexpensive brake package that keeps the dust out. And then going to the Z52 Track Package car that we're underneath, with the big arrow, you get the carbon ceramics and the brake pads off of the Z06. Yes. And then in typical Corvette fashion, each one of your packages has unique cal tuning for your PTM modes, your ABS feedback, and your steering, correct? Yes, absolutely. Yeah, we go full assault on optimizing the car on the Cup 2R and on the PS4S. And in the Z52 Sport Package, you can get the iron brake package or the carbon ceramics in that. So you can choose to spend even more money if you want to. Yes. One of the things I noticed, obviously, I noticed the lower ride frequency versus the Z06 that I spent a lot of time in at this point. But I've also noticed the car seems a little easier to drive. And it's not just due to horsepower, it's due to some of the suspension tuning in the rear. What are you doing to get this car to feel even easier to drive than the Z06, a little less twitchy? Yeah, so in ZR1, there was a lot of software and algorithm updates to the differential and the ELSD. And so a lot of that brought in some yaw dampening. And ironically, it's to help the car feel a bit more analog and a little bit more natural to the driver. And so all those benefits we exploited in ZR1 were rolled into the Grand Sport, which just makes it an all-around performer and handle really, really well. The benefit of this car now being around for the seventh model year, which is crazy to think about, is that you've got to learn constantly through the evolution of this car. Yeah, yeah. And that's what this brings, is all the learnings from C8. And it brings it all together. And all that passion that the Z06 team, ZR1 team, like that lives in this car. That is this car at a more attainable price point for everybody. 113 is tested and realistically, let's say 120 for a 2LT car is $20,000 to $40,000 less than a Z06. Yes, you lose the engine, but you get an easier car to drive overall. Yeah, and you do lose the engine, but they've done a phenomenal job on this. And this car sounds awesome. So it's a different sound, but it's a really nice V8 sound. A lot of fourth order noise. Yes. So with that, let's head to Flint. We're going to talk to Jordan's team on the small block side of things. So my name is Jordan Lee. I'm the chief engineer for the small block engine program. And I've worked on a lot of engine programs over my career, 44 years, all on engines. And we've introduced some spectacular small block engines. The LS6 is the new engine in the Grand Sport, but the LS6 engine, we've done a lot to make that engine optimized for performance in the Grand Sport. And there are some key differences with the LS6 compared to the Gen 5 LT2 that it replaces. The cylinder block is a longer stroke. It accommodates a longer stroke, a hundred millimeter stroke. So it's a 6.7 liter displacement. A lot of modifications to the cooling system. We used to have what we refer to as U-flow cooling. We now have cross-flow cooling. Targeted cooling, which keeps the cylinder head in the combustion chamber cooler to allow a higher compression ratio. We have a forged piston, which is new, and also forged connecting rods. So a lot of the internal has been hardened. And there was also a redesign of the lubrication system. In particular, the way we deliver oil to the main bearings. And then the targeted cooling too, which allowed us to keep the combustion chambers cooling up to tolerate 13 to 1 compression ratio. Other changes, a new intake manifold, a high flow, more airflow for more power, high flow intake manifold, and also a new exhaust manifold, a tri-way exhaust manifold, which replaces the 4 to 1 that was in the LT2. So very unique, a lot of optimization. The 13 to 1, the compression ratio is really a big deal, so you're going to hear us talk about that. Because in an internal combustion engine, a gas engine, a compression ratio is one of those magic attributes that improve everything. It gives you more power, more torque, better fuel economy, and better emissions. So as long as we can tolerate that without detonation or pre-ignition with pump gas, it's just a great attribute, which contributes to a high torque and high power. And it's a big key enabler to why the engine makes 535 horsepower and 525 pounds of torque. Final thoughts on the Corvette Grand Sport. First off, we have a lot of people to thank. Savage Geese Media is a very, very small organization team. There's effectively three of us with Brett being our part-time pro driver, Chris our PA, and Mark and I who do everything from filming to editing. So without all of our partners, none of this would be possible. So first off, huge thanks to our friends at Chevrolet, specifically the PR team. Trevor, Joe, and Alex have gone a long way in supporting us over the years when it comes to all these projects. Thanks to the Corvette engineers, who are wonderful people to work with. They're very passionate about their cars and open to feedback, which is very rare in this space. And of course, thanks to the small block team led by Jordan Lee. And congratulations on retiring, Jordan. They are a very passionate group of engine engineers who, again, love this stuff, which you don't always see from every OEM. Thanks to Audubon Country Club for giving us a home to make videos like this without them. None of these track videos would be possible. So if you want to learn from drivers who are as talented as Brett Casey, head to their driving academy. They have GR Academy where you get to drive GR cars. You can learn from very qualified instructors. You can attend a track day there. You can rent the track, become a member, host a corporate event. If you're an OEM looking to rent a track, they're available for all of that. And of course, thanks to our two title sponsors. First, Bridgestone tires. They are our longest sponsor. And of course, they are a tire manufacturer. So if you want to support this channel, buy some Bridgestone tires. I have the ultra sticky RE71RZ on my personal C8 Z06. I run the Potenza Sport on some of my cars. They make great all-terrain tires, all-season tires, winter tires. They make everything. So of course, if you have a car and you need tires, which one day you will, go buy some Bridgestones. And of course, thanks to our technology partner, Falcon Northwest. They're a boutique PC manufacturer. They build everything from gaming PCs to workstations to gaming or work-based laptops. We use both their gaming PC, the Fragbox, which you can customize to your heart's content to run your simulator. And they offer a very easy, well-manufactured, well-cooled, well-engineered product for you if you want to build the very, very best PC for gaming. And of course, all of our editing, everything else is done on their workstation as well. So what about the car? Well, very clearly, Mark and I love this thing. I think this is the best balanced, in many ways, easiest to drive Corvette currently sold at a tremendous value. The value is hard to argue with. It's effectively $20,000 to $30,000 less than the equivalently optioned Z06. And it is a fraction of the price of a brand new 992.223. And at least around our track, runs so close to the similar same lap time that it doesn't really matter as much driver dependent. Obviously, different tracks, different conditions do change that. The car is approachable. The LS6 is the best standard Corvette engine we've driven in a regular Corvette versus like an LS3, an LS1, and an LT1 or LT2. This car is some of the emotionality of a Z06 with their new optional center exit exhaust. It's very, very well-cooled in our very hot track conditions. It never broke past like 230, 220. And it has that low down torque to make it feel special in the landscape of force induction based engines. Now, compared to a Z06, as Andrew and I tried to explain, despite our leaderboard, it is a slower car. If you put the data of our test run on the Z06 a couple years ago, when I non-rubbered in track, the Z06 is like five to seven miles an hour faster in all the straights. And of course, the Z01 is like 20 miles an hour faster. But what you're getting is a really balanced car, something very easy to drive, highly emotional, and again, for a lot less money than a Z06. The cons of this car are the same cons you see in all the C8s, though less noticeable because you're not carrying the speed or it doesn't have the edginess of a Z06 or a Z01. The steering, while it is very direct, it doesn't have a lot of communication. And of course, the interior space is rather claustrophobic if you're a taller driver. And the brake pedal, while in this car's case, there's a good balance between speed, power, and the fact that you don't get into ABS that often, but the brake pedal itself is still not something you get a lot of direct feedback out of. And the chassis itself, not something you get a lot of direct feedback out of. However, it's very easy to drive and very, very balanced. One of the questions I've gotten a lot is, would you buy one of these or a Z06? New to new, that $20,000, $30,000 price delta makes it not that comparable, if I'm going to be honest. That's a lot of money. It's effectively like 20 or 30% of the entire purchase price of the Grand Sport versus a Z06 if you're paying a delta. However, used cars do exist and the used prices of a Z06 are right in line with the brand new prices of a Grand Sport. And I'm going to say the Z06 is a more special feeling car than this. And I think the engineers would tell you the same thing, but then you're playing the new versus used game, which again is going to be up to you, your budget, and what your priorities are. Regardless though, I think this is one of the very, very best sports cars currently sold and a tremendous car. Thanks for watching. Hope to see you again soon.