How quickly do you think the Porsche 911 Turbo * can make its way around the Nürburgring? How about the Lamborghini Murcielago LP640, or the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG? The Ferrari 430 Scuderia? Would you believe all those amazing machines have been timed at around seven minutes, forty seconds around the famous German race track.

And so has the 2012 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1.

Driven by GM test driver Aaron Link, using a production-spec car with no performance modifications, the 580-horsepower (and 556 pound-feet of torque) ZL1 proved 40 seconds faster than the regular-grade Camaro SS, says the automaker. It'* also a bit quicker than the 7:59 recorded by GM for the Cadillac CTS-V, though not quite as blistering as the Corvette Z06 and ZR1.

You might be saying that such timing exercises are meaningless, and for the most part, you'd be right. There is no official production car lap board kept anywhere but in enthusiasts' heads and hearts (oh, and on Wikipedia...), but fast times are invaluable marketing material and are at least an interesting comparative mental exercise.



source: autoblog