Hold up!

Before we run two American supercars through a good old-fashioned American drag race, let’s take a moment to realize what we’re dealing with here.

The Chevrolet Corvette has been called America’s sports car because it’s been produced for 70 years.

And while most of those 70 years consisted of a front-engine Corvette, the Corvette made a big move in 2020 with the eighth generation moving to a mid-engine layout. So what’s the big deal with a mid-engine design?

It centralizes the vehicle's mass, balancing the weight between the front and rear wheels. In the Corvette’s case it also makes it a true supercar, capable of competing with exotic vehicles like Ferraris, Lamborghinis and ta Ford GT. This newly-centralized mass, in the Corvette’s case, weighs about 3,400 pounds.

Moving that weight around is a 6.2-liter V8 engine making 495 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque. This is good for a zero-to-60 time around 2.9 seconds and a top speed around 190 miles per hour.

What’s really impressive about the Corvette is the theoretical price you pay for that performance. MSRP begins at $62,000. Now I say theoretical because we all know in today’s world what price you’re supposed to pay for a car and the price you actually pay can be quite different. And sure enough looking at local listings right now I’m not seeing any new Corvettes for below $90,000 and most of them over $100,000, even when they’ve got like 10,000 miles on them. Still, in theory, what you’re paying for the Corvette and what you’re getting is an incredibly good performance bargain. True value in the supercar world.

So that’s the Corvette’s story. But in this corner we have the new Ford GT.

Now the Ford GT hasn’t been made for almost 70 years like the Corvette, but the first ones were made over 60 years ago, when Ford decided it wanted to beat Ferrari at the world’s toughest race track.

The whole Ford-Ferrari story has been told too many times and for more entertainingly than we can do here, so we’re not going to worry about it. But let’s just say the Ford GT’s history is easily as colorful as the Corvette’s.

This latest car is the third generation of the Ford GT, and it’s already done what it was engineered to do, beat Ferrari, again, at Le Mans.

Just like the current Corvette, the Ford GT is a mid-engined vehicle. It always has been. But unlike the previous two generations, this one is not a V8, it’s powered by a V6, a twin-turbocharged V6. Horsepower in this GT is rated around 650. It’s got about 550 pound-feet of torque, and it weights around 3,100 pounds, maybe a little less in this Carbon Series. It does zero-to-60 in 2.9 seconds, just like the Corvette, and it’s got a top speed certified for 216 mph.

Another big difference between the Ford GT and the Corvette is that theoretical price. Ford GT’s are supposed to cost around $500,000, but the market value is closer to a million dollars, which means about 10 times the market price of the Corvette.

Now you’re wondering why are you paying 10 times the amount for something that has about the same zero-to-60 time? Well, there are other differences between these two cars. They’re only going to make about 1,350 Ford GTs, and they’re making that many Corvettes pretty much every month.

The Ford GT also has a full carbon fiber tub and body panels. And it’s got an extremely aggressive aerodynamic design that really doesn’t look like anything else on the road. So you’re not getting the exact same experience with both cars just because you’re getting a similar zero-to-60 time.

So that’s the history of these two cars, but let’s get back to reason why we’re all really here — a drag race.

That’s was a close race.

So, there was no advantage coming off the line, except for horsepower and torque. And as you can see, the Corvette had a slight advantage coming off the line. It’s also interesting that the Ford GT left a little bit more of a burnout. I’m not sure if that’s ‘cause the tires are Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2s, and they leave a little more black, or what. We were both using launch mode. But, the Corvette jumped probably about a third of a car length, maybe even half of a car length, on the GT from zero to 30 or zero to 40. If it had been a race to 40 or 50 mph the Corvette would have won. But, once we were both rolling, that twin turbo engine in the Ford GT pretty much reeled it in and passed the Corvette going down the quarter mile.

A cool experiment to see how these two mid-engine supercars from America stack up against each other.

When this video was posted there was no production Z06. So, somewhere out there there’s a Z06 waiting, but right now today, as this race is run and this video is posted, this was the Corvette you could race with a Ford GT.

Finally, let’s look past who won this race for just a moment and consider the larger context. Right now, today, you can buy two mid-engine supercars made in America.