The Top Speed of the C8 Corvette Z06 in Base Trim is 195 MPH and 189 MPH for the Z07

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During the 2022 Corvettes at Carlisle show, members of the Chevrolet Corvette team offered a walk-around of the 70th Anniversary 2023 Corvette Z06 in front of the Grand Stands. We caught the Friday talk on video and during that presentation, Chief Engineer Tadge Juechter revealed that the top speed of the 2023 Corvette Z06 is 195 mph.

When we heard that number, we believed (like many others) that Tadge was referring to the Z06 with the Aero Package and not the Z06 in base trim which traditionally is the quicker model due to less downforce. Since then, we have confirmed with Vehicle Corvette Chief Engineer Josh Holder that the 195 mph top speed is for the base car and that the Z06s with the big aero is likely around 189 mph.

Josh says the main reason they haven’t officially published those numbers is that they haven’t officially run a top speed test which requires two flying mile runs in each direction which is then averaged for the official speed. “You know how conservative we are,” Josh said, referring to the Team’s strict testing regimen.

In 2018, the team tested the 755-hp 2019 Corvette ZR1 with the low wing aero package at that automotive test track in Papenberg, Germany. There, the top speed was validated at 212 miles per hour by averaging the two runs of 214.88 mph and 210.20 mph together.

During the Carlisle presentation, Exterior Design Manager Kirk Bennion had just wrapped up his portion of the discussion by talking about the differences between the Z06 body, which is three and a half inches wider in the back and two inches wider in the front than the current C8 Stingray. The aero package with the two-post high wing, dive planes, and front splitter is the most aggressive aero package ever for Corvette.

That’s when Tadge resumed and gave us the 195 mph figure:

“This really is not a numbers car, we never intended to be…It was always intended to be the most pure expression of track and driver capability. That’s what we were thinking about, but the numbers are pretty good. You’ve got 670 horsepower, that’s very, very impressive. We published it before, but zero to 60 on this car is 2.6 seconds. So honestly, when we broke three seconds on the stingray, we were a little worried because this car isn’t a drag racer per se. We’re a little bit worried, but it pulls like crazy it, launches great, it’s got the big wide tire patches in the back so zero to 60 in 2.6 seconds. We haven’t really talked about it, in fact, we haven’t even done our testing at reveal, but the top speed of the car is 195 miles an hour which is pretty good.”

“It’s especially good given the downforce that we have on this car. The lift to drag ratio on this car is the best we’ve ever done, so you get pretty substantial downforce with reasonable drag and that lets you run to 195 miles an hour. Quarter mile 10.6 at over 130 miles an hour so even though it’s not a numbers car per se, it does vary respectively. But where it’s really going to shine, I believe, when we put the car out there is lap track times. That was its reason for being…all the decisions that went into it…we’re all focused on that, and so people who love to track their cars I think they’re gonna they’re probably set personal records at many tracks driving this car.”

The aero package on the Z06’s Z07 Performance Package provides 650 pounds of downforce at 300 kph (the industry standard), however, even without the aero, the front fascia is very different than that on the Stingray as it’s designed to capture and move huge amounts of air through the car for cooling purposes. And cooling was definitely a priority, with the team going so far as to add an additional radiator behind the center of the front grill.

Despite Tadge’s characterizations that the Z06 is not a numbers car (per se!), I think that most of us were thinking it would have an overall top speed that was at least 200+ mph. Both the C6 and C7 Corvette ZR1s are in the 200-mile-per-hour club and the C8 Stingray base model can get you to 194 mph. Looking for comparisons, I went looking for the C7 Z06s official time and didn’t find anything officially released. We watched John Hennessey test a bone-stock Z06 up to 185 mph in one video, while the German magazine Auto Bild took a Z07 to 189.5 mph on the autobahn. So if anything, the C8 Corvette Z06’s top speed seems to be in line with what the car was able to do historically with nearly the same power (650 hp vs. 670 hp).

I’ve included the video once again from Carlisle, and you can follow the discussion as outlined above starting at 18:30 in the video.