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CORVETTE TODAY #197 - Corvette News & Headlines, Mid January 2024
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Jul 11, 2025
CORVETTE TODAY #197 - Corvette News & Headlines, Mid January 2024 I don't know about you, but I thought that during the winter, things would slow down in regards to Corvette news. I was really wrong! Next week's News & Headlines show is packed with a ton of Corvette information. Keith Cornett from CorvetteBlogger is back and joins your CORVETTE TODAY host, Steve Garrett to keep you up-to-date on what's going on in the world of Corvette. Here are a few of the stories Steve and Keith cover: 1. We have a final count on 2023 Corvettes built! 2. BGA plant tours close February 5th 3. E-Ray production started last week 4. A new era of Corvette Racing starts in Daytona soon 5. Ron Fellows to be inducted into the Sebring Hall Of Fame 6. We have a new E-Ray video on Corvette Academy
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[Music] Welcome to Corvette Today, the show that
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talks about everything Corvette with your host Steve Garrett, lifetime member of the National Corvette Museum,
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president of the Corvette Club of Kansas City, Missouri, and radio disc jockey of the number one radio station in Kansas
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City for over 45 years. Here's Steve Garrett.
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Thanks for listening and watching Corvette Today, the show that talks about everything Corvette and the only
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current podcast dedicated to Corvette. I'm your host, Steve Garrett. I appreciate you tuning in. Corvette Today
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is brought to you by Wheelcraft. Want to dress up your Corvette with bright chrome or black chrome wheels? Visit
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from around the world. Once again, it's time to bring you the latest Corvette news and headlines with my buddy Keith
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Cornet from corvette blogger.com. Keith is here every other week. We keep you current and uptodate on what's happening
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with America's sports car. Keith, welcome back to the show. I hope you're keeping nice and warm, buddy. Yeah, you
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know, we've had some of these cold fronts going through and we're talking about temperatures in the 30s here in Florida, which is a little bit colder
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than just jacket and shorts weather as we're accustomed to. So, might have to pull out some gloves. You know what I'm saying, Steve?
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We're talking two above here in Kansas City. So, I kill for that 30s. I hear you. Well, let's get into it, buddy. Let's
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start off as we always do with a production update from the Bowling Green assembly plant. All right. Thanks, Steve. Yeah, we'll
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start first with the Stingrays. That's really what Chevy and the workers at Bowling Green are really showing some big numbers. The 2024 model year started
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in midepptember and as of last week we're seeing 10,250 Corvette Stingrays have already been
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produced for the model year. Wow. They're really cranking them out in January because something unknown
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appears to be holding back the Z06s. So more and more Stingrays are being made in their place. We've only seen 87
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Corvette Z06es completed since the new year. And it's crazy to us that they've been able to do that over a number of
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shifts. We talked about a couple weeks back we saw like they built 60 cars over two shifts. but it's really dropped off
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and we went days and days without any being produced here at the beginning of the year. So, we're really wondering what's going on. It's just really hard
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to put our fingers on and no one's really talking. During the first nine days of 2024, only three Z06s were made.
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So, something is definitely happening there. Yeah, the last number we have for total Z06 production for 2024 is 2,827.
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So, like I said, they were banging them out up into December and then something happened. they slowed way down and it's just over the last couple days we're
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seeing like counts of 18 and 19 again. Hopefully that's all returning and we'll get back up there. But some other really
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good news is that the E-rays are continuing their slow production ramp up. We saw the first three-rays for
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customers built in mid December and then it kind of went dark. Of course they were off for a week with the break there for the holidays. And then we had the
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week of January 8th sort of circled on our calendar because that's when many were sen their TPWs were set for. That's
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when we figured, okay, it's after the the holidays and stuff and that's when we'll really start to see stuff get going. I mentioned in an article that
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the ramp up, the Corvette team had said that they're going to be very deliberate. And we're actually seeing some of these quantities are almost
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mirroring what we saw during that first month of Z06 production back in September of 2022. They started off
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really slow, two or three a day, six a day, and then it just goes up from there. The unofficial count we have as
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of last Wednesday was 20 e-rays completed, but we think that number is actually over 30 as we record this
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episode. We expect this trend to continue as the ramp up goes. Eventually, we'll see in the teens and
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then hopefully in the 20s and 30s. It's happening. It's just going to take a little time. It always does, and that's okay. Also,
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we saw that in the fourth quarter, GM produced almost 9,000 Corvettes, though, didn't they? Yeah, they released their latest
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quarterly stats early January. that covers the fourth quarter of 2023 and it shows a total of 8,915
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new Corvettes were delivered during the final three months of the year. This is a number they always compare it to the
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time period before. So, we are a little bit less off. We're 2.4% less than the 9,130 Corvettes delivered in the fourth
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quarter of 2022. And then for the calendar year, because the fourth quarter numbers complete the
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12-month sales chart for us, US dealers delivered 34,353
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new Corvettes. And again, that was just.5% off the 2022 total of 34,510.
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Really put them out there. Anytime we get up to 9,000 cars or so in a quarter, that's going to be a pretty good year for us. If we can do over the 9,000, get
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into the 10,000, that's even better. Yeah. Our next quarterly sales report will be released in early April. And of course,
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we'll have those numbers here for you on Corvette today. That sounds great. And buddy, we finally
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found out finally how many Corvettes were produced in 2023. You're going to die. Well, you
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know, the number was 53,785. And tell everybody how many short that
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was of the record. 23 to beat the record. So, the official number 1979 was the
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Corvette production record. It stands at 53,87. The 2023 model year is now second all
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time with 53,785. Margin of 22 Corvettes just to tie the record. 23 to beat it. And in fact, I
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think I told you this, 23 cars is roughly just about two hours of production time at the Corvette assembly
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plant, right? So very close to being beaten. You had had that snow day that one time or if that one part had come in and they've
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been able to build a few more cars. Yep. I think they would have had the record. I think they were actually going for the record based on the dates of how things
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were happening there towards the end of the model year. It was probably a little bit of a gut punch to Har because I know he really tracks this kind of stuff.
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Yeah. We got some more numbers here. So, when it comes to the four models, Stingray Coupe leads the way, 24,834
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units. That represents 46.2% of all production. Okay? That was followed by the Stingray
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Convertible at 22,538 units. That's 41.9% of production. And
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then we have the Z06 convertible, which actually outsold the Z06 coupe. Wow. Can't tell you the last time I saw that
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happen. Probably never in my time blogging here. It was 3,34 convertibles.
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Okay. versus 3,19 coups. Wow, pretty cool there. A total of 47,372
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Stingrays were produced versus the 6,413 Z06s. Lastly, some news for you. The 70th
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anniversary models, those can be ordered four different ways. Coupe convertible Z06 Stingray. And there was a total of
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5,61 70th anniversaries produced for the model year. That represents about 10.4%
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of total production. Nice. And then finally, everyone likes to know about interior and exterior color combos. Chevrolet and NCM offers
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this great spreadsheet that breaks out those various combinations. You can get that on Corvette blog or you probably also get it over at the Corvette Museum.
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Overall, the top three colors, once again, torch red 7,895,
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arctic white, 7,216, and then black, which was 6,43.
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The least produced color was caffeine at just 536. And I believe the top color for the Z06 was black, while the top
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color for the Stingray was torch red. You can break these all out. The Corvette Museum does have a service.
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People ask me how rare my car is. I don't know. Call the museum. But the Corvette Museum has a service
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where you can send in your van and they run it through a third party that does an analysis and then you get back that nice letter that basically tells you
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your car is a one-on-one because you ordered that one thing with that other one thing that no one else did.
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That's generally how you get a one-on-one car. Right. Right. Finally got stats for 2023. Could live
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in those for a little while. There's some really cool stories out there. So, check it out. Yeah. I'm disappointed. I can't believe
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we didn't beat 79. Oh my gosh. But we do have some good news. The ordering cycle for January starts on Thursday this
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week. Yeah. More Corvettes orders. So, we're in the start of January's order cycle. Dealers received their allocation
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numbers last Thursday and then this Thursday, dealers will get the constraints and then they can start adding orders to GM's workbench ordering
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system. Some of the dealers that we spoke to, we always do a little call out and kind of our own little survey, says that Stingray numbers were actually
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relatively strong from this year, while the Z06 quantities were smaller than what we saw in December's allocations.
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And then for -ay, it looks like the model was skipped over as no dealer that we spoke with received any allocations.
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And we didn't see anybody saying they got an allocation online either. Okay, here's the thing, though. A couple of
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these dealers that are talking regarding allocations are stating that, hey, I got in these allocations and we have some
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open orders. Now, Rick Ponti on his video says he's got several available this month. And then if you go to McMullen Chevrolet website, they've got
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around 20 25 cars. These are incoming dealer stock orders that people can claim. So, if you see in there, it'll
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show you like it's a convertible Stingray. It's black with a red interior. That's what you want and go claim that. It's a car that's incoming.
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So, your time to wait went from months and months and months to maybe 6 to 8 weeks or so,
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right? If you really want a Stingray and want to be driving it this spring, that sounds like a great way to go. Again,
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both those dealers will give you those cars at MSRP. We've heard from other dealers saying that looks like they're going to be ordering some dealer stock
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orders out there as well. Looks like the tide has turned for Stingray allocations and for production. Might just be a few
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months where you can walk into a Chevrolet dealer and they might have a couple Stingrays for sale that you can just walk in and buy off the floor.
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Wouldn't that be something? It only took us 5 years, but at least we're getting there, right? Exactly. You know, and of course I'm
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talking to one of the dealers and he's like, "Yeah, that of course opens up all kinds of worms. You get to order your own cars. You get a discount for the
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customers. Hopefully they want to order their own cars at MSRP, but they'll take your car off your hands for a little
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discount." That's where that one Facebook site comes into play, right? Corvettes under MSRP. That's a great
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source for finding discounts as well. They are out there for Stingray. You just got to put the phone to work and
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find those deals. Yep. Definitely. And also, I don't know if everybody knew this, but the plant tours at Bowling Green Assembly Plant
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are closing on February 5th. So, we've only got what, 2, 3 weeks left to go. Exactly. I think we wrote this story on
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January 5th, saying one month to go. Kind of surprising. Last year, they said that the assembly plant hosted 30,000
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visitors. Wow. Which is a huge number. That's actually larger than I thought it would be. But they are halting tours starting February
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5th as the assembly plant's going to be making some internal changes. They call these changes quote manufacturing advancements. There's currently no date
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when these tours will reopen, but we are told that it's most likely going to be over a year or more that tours will be
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closed. So, if you want to get in there and see some cars, you have until February 5th to do that. Actually, 5th is Monday, so February 2nd to get in
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there and see those cars. It's our speculation they could be building some captured test leak cars for the upcoming
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2025 Corvette ZR1. We also have that rumored 2025 model year interior update
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that could see the end of the Great Wall of Buttons. That's a sloping panel that hosts Corvette's HVAC controls between
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the driver and the passenger. We've got all kinds of rumors. Got rumors of Grand Sport model. Some people are saying that the plan is just being better optimized
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for the widebody models. Whatever they're doing there, it's going to take a little while and there's obviously some things going on. And I like the
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idea of the refresh for 2025 because if you've been on the tours, you see them moving these parts around and there goes
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a Corvette's dash by you as you're on the tour. So, there's probably things like that they don't want you to see as they get all that set up. We'll have to
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wait and see what happens over the course of the next year with the tours. Get in there fast, my friends. Get in there fast. Also, Keith, our final story
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in the news section, the 2024 Corvette is first on Consumer Reports top 10 most
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satisfying cars. That's really great cuz Consumer Reports didn't like us at all at one point.
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Yeah. You know, up until C8 time, it was a lovehate relationship. They love to hate us is how I like to say,
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right? But we actually have seen a softening of that and a lot of it is just because of the change the C8
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architecture and some of the things that they've done especially the quality of the materials on the interior. That was always something that Consumer Reports
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knocked this down. But the thing about this story is that this is coming from Corvette owners. So they do a survey and
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a whopping 93% of 2024 Corvette owners said they buy the car again. That's
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number one now on Consumer Reports top 10 most satisfying cars. Other cars in the top 10 were the Lexus NX plug-in
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hybrid EV at 87%, a BMW X5 at 85%, a Rivian R1S at 84%. The Corvette was the
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only GM product to make this top 10, and it's because of Corvette owners. They love their car and they would definitely
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buy another one. Nice. Well, Keith, let's take our first break. When we come back, Corvette Racing and Corvette Rumors are on deck
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You're listening and watching Corvette Today with Steve Garrett. Hey, thanks for checking out Corvette
17:04
Today on podcast and YouTube. It's the only current podcast dedicated to Corvette. Corvette today is brought to
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you by Wheelcraft. You want your Corvette looking its best. We'll dress it up with bright chrome or black chrome
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wheels. Visit wheelcraft.com and learn about their advanced PVD chrome finishing. They can refinish your wheels
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or do a wheel exchange and you get a 5-year warranty. Visit wheelcraft.com or
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call them 833639-4231. I'm your host Steve Garrett. With me is
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Keith Cornet from corvette blogger.com. Every other week, we keep you current and up to date on what's happening in
17:38
the world of Corvette. In this second segment, we always talk about Corvette racing and Corvette rumors. First,
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Keith, we're starting a new era of Corvette racing, and it starts at the end of January. Yeah, actually, it's race week as the
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2024 IMSA series kicks off its calendar at the Rolling Tour of Daytona. The team just wrapped up three days of practice
17:55
during the roar before the 24 and then they actually held qualifying for Daytona's pole position. As we record
18:01
this prior to the weekend, you got to check out Corvette Blogger to see where the Z06 GT3R racers will be starting on
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the grid. One of the very exciting things coming up here is the addition of more Corvettes that are running in IMSA.
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Of course, we have the two Corvettes in the GTD amateur class now with AWA Racing fielding those cars. We received
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our first press release from Pratt Miller Motorsports for the event. And the nice thing is that not only they including quotes from the pro drivers as
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we've always had, but it looks like they're going to be discussing the amateur team as well. So for us it looks like almost seamless transition as
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Corvette Racing brings in these other racing groups into their PR fold will give us all the lowdowns as they happen
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for each race. So both prior to the race and then post race and their reactions there. Pretty exciting stuff. The Rolex
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24 Daytona kicks off at 1:40 p.m. Eastern time this Saturday. The start of that race will be broadcasted on NBC, so
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you better be there. Yeah, that sounds like fun. I'm glad it's going to be on network television, too. It'll be easier for us to find.
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At least the first race. I know it jumps around. I think it even ends up on Discovery Channel for a minute. Oh wow. But if you've got Peacock, you're a
19:01
Chiefs fan. I'm sure you've got Peacock. Of course. Of course. Peacock of course required people if you
19:07
wanted to watch that Chiefs football game a couple weeks back. You had that Peacock. Well, all the races are shown on Peacock. So, it is an investment and
19:14
if you make it for football or if there's something else you want to watch, that's where you'll find him racing. So, it's good to have anyway.
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Catch it out on NBC at 1:40 p.m. on Saturday. Sounds good. And speaking of one of the teams, TF Sports has shown off their new
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GT3R livery. They're going to be in the WEC. Yeah, these are cool colors. Of course,
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they're using the traditional black and yellow colors combined. They did a fantastic job on these designs. It
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almost reminds us of the Corvette C6RS when they race. One was in yellow with black accents and one was black with the
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yellow accents. It's not that extreme, but they did a fantastic job on these. We've seen six liveries so far for 2024
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and of those six, this is the best. I'd even say that these are better than the Corvette racing livery. Wow.
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You'll definitely want to check those out. WC previously always kicked off or at least the last few years has kicked off at Sebring and that's not going to
20:03
happen this year. They're actually kicking off March 2nd in Qar for the first World Endurance Championship race.
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There was some talk that maybe TF Sport would not be fielding these cars until maybe the second race. So, I'm going to
20:14
go back and take a look at that to see if that's the case. There was something they're racing a Mercedes now. I believe the Mercedes AMG. Okay. And I think they
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might have had one more race for that car, which would have been the opener at Qar. We'll check that out. But man, dare
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I say, these are the best liveries for 2024, and you'll definitely see why. Yeah. And you can check them out on the
20:31
Corvette Today News and Headline show on the YouTube channel. You can see all the liveries there. There you go. Also, our buddy Ron Fellows is going to
20:38
be inducted into the Sebring Hall of Fame. That is so good news. Ron was on Corvette today, episode number 104, and
20:45
that was middle of April of 2022. But it was great to see him get this accolade. Yeah, one of the nicest guys in
20:51
motorsports. He'll talk to anybody for as long as you want to. Just a fantastic guy. Another honor in his impressive
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career. He's one of six new inductees into the Sebring Hall of Fame. They do this voting every two years. I went
21:03
back. I tried to pull up his stats for just Sebring. It looks like he participated 10 races, won four of those
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races. In addition, he has seven total podium finishes, six pole positions, and
21:13
has raced over 3,000 laps at that historic track. huge numbers. We're talking just one track. We're not
21:19
talking a career. These newest members of the Hall of Fame will be inducted before the start of the 72nd Mobile One
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12 hours of Sebring. That'll happen on Saturday, March 16th. And then if you're at that race, you can also listen to
21:30
Ron. He's going to talk at a seminar on Friday, March 17th at 9:30 a.m. That's at the Gallery of Legends building,
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which is sort of like their little Hall of Fame building. They also have the old vintage race cars in there as well. So, you can hear Ron talk Friday, March 17th
21:43
at 9:30. Definitely take advantage of that if you're at the race. That sounds great. Also, Keith, in our rumors category, we touched on this in
21:50
the first segment of the show, but Bowling Green has only built 89 Z06s since December 21st. What do you think
21:56
is going on? It's really tough to say. We haven't really heard of any part shortages. And the Stingray production, there's a
22:02
couple different weather events that's happened over the course of the last few weeks. Nothing there is really saying, well, we don't see the Stingray slowing
22:08
down. So, it does seem to be Z06 specific. might even be widebody specific because we do have the -rays
22:13
starting to ramp up. Maybe there are some things that they were holding back to make sure that the -ays do get that smooth ramp up that we've been talking
22:20
about. We rely on these numbers. They come from Roger Keel. He posts these unofficial Corvette production estimates
22:26
on Facebook. And some of the people are saying, you know, well, it's Facebook. It's unreliable. Why are you getting your stats off of there? If you saw his
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chart, you'd see why. And the fact is that we've been following for so long, a lot of his data has matched up with
22:37
other data. We also rely on a website called CA Tracker which counts cars by their window stickers being produced.
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They lag a little bit behind the immediate day after reports that we get from Roger Keel, but it still shows that
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something's going on at the beginning of January where a slowdown in Z06 production was actually really
22:55
happening. It does appear the last few days we've started to see it pick up. Last Wednesday and Thursday, which is our last two dates of info, we had 18
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and 19 units completed on those days. Hopefully, we're going to still see that kind of count. Again, we've seen counts
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in the 60s before. We saw do I think 71 over a course of two shifts. So, we know it's possible. There's just something
23:15
happening there. There's some other things going on. We talked about the redesign and doing some other things in the plant, right?
23:20
Maybe they've slowed down just a little bit and then we'll take advantage of that once some of those improvements and
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enhancements are done over there. One of the rumors of the plant shutdown was because they're going to make enhancements to facilitate more widebody
23:33
production. And of course, we call those the Z's and the E. It's rumors. We don't know why speculation wise, but it's just
23:40
something to keep an eye on. Again, the numbers don't lie. We'll be watching those. And hopefully in two weeks, we'll be able to say, "Yeah, remember that
23:45
slow down appears all to be in our rearview window." That'd be nice, buddy. For sure. All right, Keith, let's take our last break.
23:51
When we come back, it's the lighter side of Corvette. Coming up next on Corvette Today.
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And now, back to Corvette Today with your host and my husband, Steve Garrett.
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Thanks again for listening and watching Corvette Today, the show that talks about everything Corvette. Corvette
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give them a call 833-639-4231. I'm your host, Steve Garrett. Every
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other week, Keith Cornet from Corvette Blogger is with me. We keep you current and up to date on what's happening with
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America's sports car. In this final segment, we always talk about the lighter side of Corvette. Keith, Yahoo
26:50
Finance goes to Bowling Green assembly plant and they watch the first -ay come off the assembly line. Why didn't they
26:56
invite us? Yeah, exactly. That's what I've been trying to tell you, Steve. Actually,
27:01
this is a pretty good video. It kind of came to hit us by surprise. We see the guy standing there in front of a car and it actually is a black. He visited the
27:09
assembly plant. The first retail 2024 Corvette -ay coming off the assembly line belongs to Mr. Hendrik. And it
27:15
appears that Mr. Hendrickk streak of outfitting his VIN 001 cars remains intact as we see the first is black with
27:21
a dipped adrenaline red interior. Nice. The Yahoo Finance report. This is a video. So he goes behind the wheel of a
27:27
car. He goes out driving it. Nice little recap of the -ray and what to expect. We don't see a lot of the number one car
27:32
coming off the line. Just a brief picture. We think that Chevy's going to save that as they've done for all their launches where they do a special press
27:39
release show the car and some other details about it. Right. For Z06, that came about a month after
27:44
production started. So, I don't know if we're going to be seeing that anytime this month because production actually
27:49
started back in December or if really it's going to come within the next few weeks fall into February because we're in the ramp up phase right now. You can
27:56
see that video on Corvette Blogger and also on YouTube. Just search for Yahoo Finance and it'll come up.
28:01
That sounds good. And also, the Corvette Academy put out a new video as well. Yeah, it's been a few months since we've
28:07
seen a Ray Academy video. This one features several Chevrolet and Corvette team members discussing the new
28:12
performance hybrid sports car. Not a whole lot of information. There's a pretty cool quote in there. My favorite quote comes from Chevrolet marketing
28:19
director Brad Frans. He says, quote, "Not many times in a career do you have the opportunity to take such an iconic
28:25
car and take it to the next level of performance. The E-Ray absolutely does that." The other thing though is
28:30
interesting. These videos don't do much in dispelling the myths of the first performance hybrid. We still find
28:35
people, they see the E in the E-Ray name and think the car is totally electric, right? We ran another video, I think
28:41
last week from Mike at Break a Speed who wanted to dispel some of these myths. And you should read the comments, they're crazy. You know, it's just
28:47
people, I wouldn't be caught dead in an electric Corvette. Well, you know, if that's how you really feel about stuff,
28:53
then perhaps you need a new hobby. You know, it's pretty sad, but also somewhat comical. I really can't wait for these cars to be out in public and these
28:59
people that are so anti-ERA and get their first taste of being pushed in the back of their seat as that front-wheel
29:04
drive kicks in because that's really what it's all about for me is the all-wheel drive system of the -ay and what it can do. All these years I've
29:11
been covering Corvettes and seeing, oh, here comes the GTR or here comes another all-wheel drive car. You know,
29:17
Corvette's got no chance in that situation. Well, now it does. Yeah. And I think a lot of what people are missing about the -ay is the hybrid
29:24
is built for performance. It's not built for distance driving. So, it's to enhance performance of the Corvette. And
29:31
it's the first all-wheel drive Corvette we've ever had. So, if people understand that, hopefully they'll get away from,
29:36
"Oh, I would never be caught driving an electric Corvette. It's built for added performance."
29:42
There was an article that came out, we didn't cover it. It was from a CNN writer who talked about the Corvette
29:48
misses its mark because it's not focused on fuel economy with its hybrid setup. And that's totally the wrong reason why.
29:54
It's like just went right over his head on the real reason why it's for performance. And it's only for performance. Yes, absolutely.
30:00
You're not going to see any major gains from fuel economy. Unless you religiously drive in stealth mode, and
30:06
I'm talking about turning off the car and turning it back on, going another four miles, charge up the battery, turn it back off, turn it back on. Yeah,
30:12
you'll get some fuel economy savings that way, but it's not built for that. It's built for pushing you in back of the seat, hooking up those front wheels,
30:18
and then beating whoever is next to you. Exactly. Right. Also, our next story, Keith, it was nice to see, you know, we
30:23
touched in the first segment on the Consumer Reports award that Corvette got. Motor Authority, which is a really
30:29
good website, named the C8 Z06 as the best car to buy in 2024.
30:34
Yeah, they start off the article, it says, "It may not be perfect, but the 2024 Corvette Z06 doesn't miss by much."
30:40
That's a pretty cool thing to say about the car. One of the other things they really like about it is it special engine. They call the dual clutch
30:46
transmission as incredibly responsive and capable of keeping power in any scenario. And then their final quote,
30:52
they say, "Ferrari's already moved on past naturally aspirated flat plane crank V8s and into its twin turbo V6 and
30:59
the hybrid era. There will be a faster, more powerful Corvettes, but it's impossible any will be as special as the
31:05
Corvette Z06." There you go. Pretty cool quote there. Of course, the best car to buy if you can get one. We
31:10
know that the lines are still long for the car. So, good luck to those people in 2024 because it is a special car.
31:15
It is a special car. And if you want a really special car, we saw a 2020 captured test fleet Corvette that was
31:21
offered for sale at 10 grand under MSRP. Yeah, we found this on Craigslist and
31:27
the more I kept reading, my eyes just kept getting wider and wider. It ends up being the 119th C8 Corvette Stingray to
31:33
be built. They built a run of CTF cars. These are the ones that go to Corvette executives and engineers. They drive
31:40
them. But because they're CTF cars, they're sailable. So those cars that finished their testing and evaluations
31:45
were offered to dealers and sold four years after the 2020s were out. We've got one for sale. This car has actually
31:52
undergone a rigorous inspection. It's a certified pre-owned car, and Chevrolet certified pre-owned cars have their own
31:58
warranties and additional things that they do. So really nice to see it have that additional protection in place for
32:04
the car. What's interesting is like we said a capture test fleet car. It was one of the cars that was used to train
32:09
dealers and others out at Spring Mountain. Oh yes, it's gently used. It only has about 9,000 miles on it, I believe. And like I
32:16
said, the car is offered for 10,000 under the original MSRP of 82,000. It's got the Z-51 performance package. It's
32:22
got the visible carbon fiber roof, carbon flash wheels, and microfiber steering wheel. The selling dealer is Gamblin Motors out of Washington State,
32:29
and they are offering this car for 71,996. Boy, that's nice. Our final story,
32:34
Keith, you and I got to go to Mikum CM. It's two weeks of auctioning, almost 5,000 vehicles right after the new year,
32:42
and we have the top 11 Corvettes sold at Mikum CMI. Yeah, great to see you there, Steve.
32:47
Just a great time. We had, of course, we got to hang out with some of the consigners, of course, Dr. Mark Davis,
32:52
Tom Hill, who was offering the L88, a bunch of other people, just great people. We did a great tour. Mikum did a
32:58
Corvette day tour with us. We teamed up with Bloomington Gold and the great folks from Vet Views magazine as well.
33:03
Now that the auction's over, we do have the top Corvette sales from Mikum Civ 2024. I'm going to just run down the
33:08
list real quick. Number one, the bestselling was the first and last Corvette L88s. They were sold as a
33:14
group. That lot sold for $2,585,000. Wow. But you get two cars for that. They're
33:20
both L88, so that's pretty cool there. 1963 Corvette Z06 with the big tank.
33:25
935,000. Third on the list, 1963 Harley Earl styling car. That blue car that we
33:31
saw with the cool outboard exhaust on it. Yep. That sold for $83,000.
33:37
There was another Corvette Z06 from 1963. Sold for $770,000. Number five on
33:42
the list. This kind of surprised me. I actually thought it would go a little bit higher, but it was the 1953 Kind Dig
33:47
ZF1 custom roadster. Yeah, this is the number five car. It sold for $777,000.
33:54
Yeah, I thought it would gone higher, too. That was a pretty car. I really enjoyed looking at that one. And then back to
33:59
original cars, a 1969 Corvette L88 convertible that sold for $495. We had a
34:05
62 Corvette convertible. This was the one part of Mark Davis's collection. $456,000.
34:11
Our guy Steve that put together the analysis of this thinks that this might be the highest non-racing 1962 Corvette
34:18
ever sold. Yeah, that was a special car there. We have another 63 split window coupe that sold
34:23
for $412,000 in 500. That car was actually part of the split window group, the split window collection. And then we
34:29
had another from the collection, uh, 6306, 385. Two more on the list. 1958 Corvette
34:35
convertible, 363,000. And then finally, a 1963 Corvette split window coupe,
34:40
352,000. Fantastic sales. Of course, they had over 460 Corvettes there. You
34:46
know what the least selling car was for Corvette? What's that? I believe it was a 91 or a 94. There's
34:52
two of them. and they sold for like $4,950. No kidding.
34:57
So, you can get a running driving Corvette for under $5,000. I would call that a bargain. Absolutely right. Well, buddy, thanks
35:04
for being back on Corvette today. We'll see you in two weeks and that'll be show number 199.
35:10
Wow. We're closing in on magical 200, Steve. Can't wait to hear that one. In the meantime, if we see you out on the
35:15
roads, throw up that hand and keep waving. Thanks again for listening and watching Corvette Today. And be sure to tell your
35:20
family, friends, and other Corvette enthusiasts about the Corvette Today Show. And thanks to our sponsors,
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