[camaro5]

BY JACK BARUTH
OCT 25, 2017

The ZL1 1LE combines the freight-train power of the old ZL1 with the track-focused running gear of the Z/28.

The 300-pound-lighter Alpha platform displays its racetrack pedigree unashamedly whether it’s underpinning a rental-rat V6 Camaro or an F-117-folded-sheetmetal ATS-V.

Add in the gloss-black wings-and-splitter aero package that made our white test example look like an anime Stormtrooper, and the result is a car that

attacks NCM Motorsports Park with enough ferocious ability to make you think that the “C” in “NCM” stands for “Camaro,” not “Corvette”.

Truth is, the 650-horsepower, 6.2-liter pushrod V8 finds a much happier home here than it does in the Corvette Z06.

The Camaro may have to cut a much larger hole in the wind, even with the so-called “flowtie” hollow Chevy emblem in the gaping grille,
but the same bluff front that costs the ZL1 several MPH down the main straight of our test track also makes cooling the engine a much simpler matter.

Our two days at NCM featured some remarkably high temperatures for September, but the supercharged 1LE didn't exhibit any of the heat issues for which the Z06 has become a bit notorious.

It didn’t even appear to suffer much supercharger heat soak.

http://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars...pcoty-preview/