A Corvette ZR1X Shatters Yet Another Record With Pikes Peak Hillclimb Time
Every year, auto manufacturers, drivers, and fans gather in Colorado for the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb event. The road course consists of 156 corners up the side of the mountain. This year, at the 104th running of the event, Corvettes showed up and made history.
Notably, driver Emelia Hartford became the "Fastest Woman on Four Wheels" after piloting a 2026 Corvette through the 12.42-mile course in 10:18.018.
This was also the first Pikes Peak event for the new Corvette ZR1X, not only the most powerful and fastest Corvettes Chevy has ever made, but one of the most powerful American cars ever made period. It ran the course in 9:30.104 with JR Hildebrand in the cockpit. That time broke the record for fastest hybrid propulsion production car. Although it may not look like it with its fire breathing V8, the ZR1X borrows a bit from the hybrid Corvette E-Ray. As such, it has a 186-horsepower electric motor mounted on the front axle. This assists in the ZR1X's absurdly fast 0-60 time of "under two seconds," according to GM.
An American supercar
The ZR1X has a number of other performance car records. Namely, it's the quickest American production car currently for sale. With a 5.5-liter twin-turbo V8 paired with electric motors, the 1,250-horsepower Corvette ZR1X is a bona fide supercar killer that's made in Kentucky with records to back it up.
GM clocked it running a 8.675 second quarter-mile time and a 0-60 time of 1.68 seconds. That title is fought for by cars like the Dodge Challenger SRT Demon 170, which has been discontinued. For reference, that's faster than the French-built Bugatti Chiron's 2.4 second 0-60 time.
Following the patriotic theme, the Corvette ZR1X also holds the record for the fastest American car around the Nürburgring in Germany. It went around the 12.94 mile long and 170 corner "Green Hell" in 6:49.275. What makes it even more impressive is that the driver was not a professional race car pilot, but the Corvette's Vehicle Dynamics Engineer Drew Cattell.