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Used to be you could walk into an In-N-Out Burger and order a 10x10, and they'd build it. They'd stack it 10 patties and 10 slices of cheese high and hand it to you with a straight face. Then someone ordered a 100x100, because of course they did. A blog post went viral, and at some point, In-N-Out drew a line, in effect deciding that anything more than 4x4 stops being a hamburger.
General Motors found no such line. In fact, Corvette engineers told us the ZR1X was the plan all along.
To make the track-oriented Z06, Chevy wanted a high-revving V-8, thus the flat-plane 5.5-liter LT6 was born. When it was time for the ZR1, they twin-turbocharged that V-8 until it made 1064 horsepower and called it the LT7. And the ZR1X? Let's add that electric front axle from the E-Ray. With changes: The electric motor now makes 186 horsepower—more than the current Mazda Miata produces—and supplies motivational force up to 160 mph, because Chevy wanted it to last the full length of a drag-strip pass.
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So here's a 4139-pound, all-wheel-drive Corvette with 1250 horsepower. Its resulting 3.3-lb/hp ratio remains difficult to contextualize even after driving the thing for a few days.
The first day, you swear. Involuntarily. The way you do when you see the Grand Canyon or a rocket launch for the first time: You thought you understood the magnitude, and you were wrong.
Under just about any driving scenario, you get maybe two seconds of full throttle before your license is at risk. That's the window. The thing that justifies the engineering—the brakes, the aerodynamic considerations, all of it—lives inside the duration of a good yawn.
There are EVs this quick. The difference is that their power arrives quietly and with the immediacy of a light switch. The ZR1X winds up. There are downshifts, turbos spooling, a gathering of something ominous that fills the time the way a good drummer uses a fill: You hear it coming, and it still hits you. The sound isn't pretty; it's more released than produced. A loud and flat bark that's the byproduct of something genuinely violent happening mechanically behind your head. That authority, and the buildup that delivers it, is the entire case for internal combustion in 2026.
By day two, the swearing stops. It's replaced with engagement. You choose the throttle. You choose the consequences. You have confidence in the steering. You also have it in the brakes: a new Alcon system comprising 10-piston front and six-piston rear calipers gripping 16.5-inch carbon-ceramic rotors, the largest ever fitted to a Corvette.
You also have the invisible electronic controls, which Chevy had to rearchitect from the E-Ray. In that car, the front axle reacts to what you're doing with the pedals, using its motor to balance and control the vehicle with regen brake torque vectoring. Chevy engineers told us that, due to the tremendous power of the LT7, this reactive approach was too slow. The ZR1X instead models and predicts what you're trying to do. That's why 1250 horsepower becomes familiar inside 48 hours. Beneath it all, the math is always running ahead of you.
On our unprepped test surface, we recorded 2.1 seconds to 60 mph and 9.2 seconds to the quarter-mile at 155 mph. That's a 0.1-second and 0.3-second improvement to 60 mph and through the quarter-mile, respectively, over the ZR1 we tested in the same configuration, and it puts the ZR1X within a tenth of the two quickest cars we've ever tested in the quarter-mile: the Bugatti Chiron Super Sport and the Lucid Air Sapphire.
But it should be faster. Yes, we were testing a ZTK Track Performance package car, wearing the Carbon Fiber Aero package's (required to spec the ZTK package) longboard-sized wing that helps make 1200 pounds of downforce, on its track alignment, with 2.0 degrees of negative camber in front and 1.5 degrees in the rear working against every launch. But Chevy's own numbers on this setup on an unprepared surface were 1.9 seconds to 60 mph and a 9.0 in the quarter. Chevy attributed the gap between its numbers and ours to surface quality. Guess we'll just have to try again and see if we can close the gap at our local test track.
Despite carrying an extra 308 pounds compared to the ZR1, and much of it in the nose, the ZR1X—aided by the ZTK package's massive and sticky Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R tires—averaged 1.15 g's around the skidpad and stopped from 70 mph in 139 feet and 100 mph in 267 feet. These results are essentially identical to the lighter ZR1's. Different surfaces and days make small differences hard to credit, but the fact that the extra weight didn't penalize the results suggests the new Alcons and front-axle regen are earning their keep.
No individual records fell during testing, but look at the whole: A car with a removable roof, a functional trunk, and a curb weight not far from that of a mid-size crossover posted world-class numbers in every category we measure. The specialists that beat it in any one discipline can't touch it in the others. The competence is so broad it borders on the absurd.
Which brings us to the NHRA. Their Street Legal rules say production cars can't run quicker than 9.0 seconds or faster than 150 mph in the quarter. Despite lagging Chevy's results, our ZR1X tester—in the wrong configuration on an unprepared surface—still broke the trap speed limit. We asked the NHRA what happens when a ZR1X owner shows up to their local strip and does the same or better. Their response? "NHRA would observe the car in its test configuration and be open to an opportunity to learn of its safety advancements." Translation: They hadn't planned for this either.
So the ZR1X is built for speed that isn't always welcome where speed is officially encouraged. It exists in a gap between what is engineered and what is permitted, and it doesn't seem particularly concerned. It rides smoothly. It takes pump gas. It idles like it has nothing to prove. It has a Stealth mode with four or five miles of electric range up to 45 mph, so you can leave the neighborhood politely. You can picture running ordinary errands in a machine that, according to its engineers, can outaccelerate a Mazda Miata with its front tires locked.
The ZR1X is a quarter-million-dollar argument that capability shouldn't be justified by destination. That the menu should go to infinity, and the only reason it doesn't is failure of nerve.
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Specifications
Specifications
2026 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1X
Vehicle Type: mid-engine, front-motor, all-wheel-drive, 2-passenger, 2-door targa
PRICE
Base/As Tested: $212,195/$255,960
Options: Carbon-fiber wheels, $13,995; 3LZ package (heated steering wheel, leather interior, Bose Performance Series stereo, power lumbar seats, front and rear cameras, two inductive phone chargers, power-folding and heated mirrors, heated and vented GT2 seats), $11,000; ZR1X Carbon Fiber Aero package (visible carbon-fiber wing, dive planes, and hood spoiler), $10,495; front-axle lift, $2595; ZTK Track Performance package (ZTK suspension and Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R tires), $1500; carbon-fiber interior trim, $1500; body-color carbon-fiber split-window trim, $995; blue brake calipers, $695; Stealth interior trim package, $595; black exhaust tips, $395
POWERTRAIN
twin-turbocharged and intercooled DOHC 32-valve 5.5-liter V-8, 1064 hp, 828 lb-ft + AC motor, 186 hp, 145 lb-ft (combined output: 1250 hp; lithium-ion battery pack)
Transmissions: direct-drive/8-speed dual-clutch automatic
CHASSIS
Suspension, F/R: control arms/control arms
Brakes, F/R: 16.5-in vented, cross-drilled carbon-ceramic disc/16.5-in vented, cross-drilled carbon-ceramic disc
Tires: Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R ZP
F: 275/30ZR-20 (97Y) TPC Spec 3124
R: 345/25ZR-21 (104Y) TPC Spec 4033
DIMENSIONS
Wheelbase: 107.2 in
Length: 186.7 in
Width: 79.7 in
Height: 48.6 in
Passenger Volume: 51 ft3
Trunk Volume: 9 ft3
Curb Weight: 4139 lb
C/D TEST RESULTS
60 mph: 2.1 sec
100 mph: 4.0 sec
130 mph: 6.2 sec
150 mph: 8.5 sec
1/4-Mile: 9.2 sec @ 155 mph
170 mph: 11.7 sec
190 mph: 18.5 sec
Results above omit 1-ft rollout of 0.2 sec.
Rolling Start, 5–60 mph: 2.6 sec
Top Gear, 30–50 mph: 1.6 sec
Top Gear, 50–70 mph: 1.7 sec
Top Speed (mfr claim): 225 mph
Braking, 70–0 mph: 139 ft
Braking, 100–0 mph: 267 ft
Roadholding, 300-ft Skidpad: 1.15 g
EPA FUEL ECONOMY
Combined/City/Highway: 14/12/19 mpg
