Chevy 2012 Corvette Centennial package

Chevrolet the old girl of American Auto is 100 years old this very year. To celebrate and bring back that youthful feeling – late midlife crisis ? – Chevy is releasing the Centennial Edition Z06. The Centennial Package itself can be applied to all of the current Z06 models, all the way up to the King of the Hill ZR1.

No price has been released for the upgrade as of yet. To keep the party spirit going Chevy auctioned a Silk Black Centennial Corvette through Barrett-Jackson Auctions, who auctioned it off for charity, it sold for $175,000 USD

The Centennial Package brings together parts from previous option packs and some special parts from the next vette the Z07. It’s sort of like a best of compilation to celebrate. Carbon is used extensively, rockers covers, front splitter, roof and raised hood. Performance upgrades include Brembo ceramic brakes, Magnetic Ride Control. Tech include Heads up Display, Bluetooth hands free and Bose stereo. Lots of leather over heated seats finishes it off.

The Centennial auctioned over the weekend wasn’t the full ZR1 – ZR1 is the highest spec Corvette that Chevy sell – , its specs are still impressive though, power is delivered by a monster 7.0-litre LS7 V8 – 505 hp, 637 Nm of torque – and it meets the road through 19 inch front, 20 inch rear wheels. The rims are satin black light weight spun aluminum. The top spec ZR1 Corvette (codename Blue Devil) has completed Nurburgring test track in Germany in 7min 26.4sec. This was the supercharged version of the Vette with more power – 638 horsepower, 819Nm of torque – than the Centennial that was auctioned.

The Corvette is America’s heritage sports car. When it burst onto the USA highways in 1953 it created the american sports car genre. The early Corvette’s looked stylish and sporty, not something Detroit – home of rivals like Ford – was known for. The Mustang was still 11 years away from released so this was the American sports car for a decade. Corvette is on its sixth generation at the moment with the seventh – Z07 – generation being in design since 2007, the classic Stingray was part of the C3 – third – generation and started the shift from the classic 50’s style to modern muscle car style. The competition took a while to catch up to the Vette but with models like the Ford Mustang, Plymouth Barracuda and the Pontiac GTO all coming to market within a few years Chevy had some competition all of a sudden.

The Vette may be a little plastic, it may look a bit like a toy but you have to admit it looks damn good in black. So America keep the dream alive, keep driving them highways and if you can do it in a car this good looking, why not.

Pictures courtesy of Barrett-Jackson Auctions

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