1966 Chevrolet Corvette Long-Term Road Test

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1966 Chevrolet Corvette: Would You Rather a Camry?

July 29, 2015

What are we doing pitting our 1966 Chevrolet Corvette against a modern Toyota Camry? I'm not sure we know ourselves, but the answer is probably the same we use to explain any of man's explorations: because it's there.

The V6 Camry we just tested dashed from zero to 60 in 6.6 seconds. The Corvette: 7.9 seconds. The Camry is 1.3 seconds faster through the quarter-mile with a top speed nearly 20 mph faster than the Vette. But on the track, the Camry is nose-heavy and, in the words of Engineering Editor Jay Kavanagh, sloshes "from apex to apex with equal parts understeer and indifference."

The Stingray, meanwhile, comes alive on the road course. It takes a leap of faith to willingly break its bias-ply tires free, but we learned that the less you fear it, the more it rewards.

Out on the track, Road Test Editor Carlos Lago managed to coax the Camry out of its awkward rapport with the track (or as much as one can when working with all-season tires and an automatic transmission), and let the Corvette coax him into wiggly-tailslides that take us back to another era.

Dan Frio, Automotive Editor