You're conflating the Mustang GTD for the Mustang GT3. The GTD has never raced at Le Mans or Daytona, and neither has the ZR1. The Mustang GT3s did manage a 3rd place in LMGT3 at LeMans which was their highest finish in WEC as they went on to finish 13th and 17th overall out of 18 teams.
You're confusing the Corvette GT3 and the Corvette GTE. The GT3 has 3 wins and 5 podiums across the entire group, mustang has 1 win 4 podiums.You're conflating the Mustang GTD for the Mustang GT3. The GTD has never raced at Le Mans or Daytona, and neither has the ZR1. The Mustang GT3s did manage a 3rd place in LMGT3 at LeMans which was their highest finish in WEC as they went on to finish 13th and 17th overall out of 18 teams.
The GT3 also had a 1st place at Daytona this year, the first win for the mustang GT3 racing program after managing 0 wins and 2 podiums last season in IMSA with 3 cars, placing 6th and 10th in GTD pro and 15th in GTD.
Despite all the marketing and the "race to road" quote, I'm struggling to find a single component the GTD shares with the GT3, and it looks like the only thing they have in common is appearance, not that the GT3 has much racing pedigree yet regardless, although things are looking up this season.
As for Corvette's accomplishments, the ZR1 has never raced at Le Mans, obviously, but Corvette Racing has 9 class wins and 13 additional podiums at Le Mans, along with 4 daytona class wins (Not including the privateer AWA corvette that won the amateur GTD class this year at Daytona), and a podium this year in GTD Pro. Not to mention 127 overall wins in IMSA, WEC, ALMS and other racing series, which is 126 more than the Mustang GT3.
The C8 ZR1 also seems to have more in common with the race car than the GTD, since its Z06 derived engine shares 70% of its components with the GT3 racecar and the ZR1's s-duct and split window cooling were prototyped on the Z06 GT3.R racecar.
The GTD has run a sub-7 minute Nürburgring lap, which is an impressive feat and a milestone accomplishment for an American car, and one that the ZR1 has yet to publicly attempt. Enough about corvettes though, since this is a mustang forum. I'm sure that they can squeeze more out of the GTD with calibration, tuning, practice, and ideal conditions, but the actual poor conditions of the lap attempt are largely exaggerated.
Ford used media lap footage from their rained-out attempt in October in their mini documentary covering their Nürburgring lap record, which was set on August 7th. They didn't make any mention of rain or a damp track in regards to their actual lap record attempt, only mentioning sub-optimal conditions at the end of the video. Dirk Müller also made no mention of the conditions during his lap breakdown, and the track appears fairly dry in the onboard. The only comment I can find from Müller about the lap is what he said when Car and Driver reached out for comment:
Conditions could probably be more ideal, but wet is not the word to describe this lap, just an idea that has been propagated due the implications from Ford mentioning sub-optimal conditions and showing wet lap media footage. I'm sure they can shave off more time regardless though as previously mentioned, but this wet-lap concept has been overblown.
Where am I confusing the two? I spoke about corvette racing as a whole (C5.R-Corvette Z06 GT3.R), and the engine which was jointly developed and put in the C8.R and Corvette Z06 GT3.R
because thats opening a can of worms that makes comparison entirely useless, the Mustang has been racing since 1965, it has WAY more time, WAY more races, WAY more podiums, and WAY more wins considering theres a few decades where Corvette wasnt even racing
As much as I'd love to talk all about the racing history of corvettes and mustangs this is getting off topic. I only butted in to this conversation to correct that one guy comparing the mustang GTD and Corvette ZR1 by races neither of them have ever been in. You are right in saying comparison is entirely useless because neither road car has much in common with the race car at all despite appearances and media claims.
Saw this yesterday. Basically little speed phenom says what we’ve been saying since the weight was known. It’s an already heavy s650 with a bunch of stuff bolted on, so it got even heavier.
Hey, thanks for sharing!
Wish he could get both, track both, and give his comparison impressions along with some hard numbers. He did grrat with the 2020 gt500 and c8 a few years ago.
I have a feeling he’ll get the ZR1 somehow. He does talk about it a lot.
I don't think he ever answered your question.
Dearborn Engine Plant. The 5.2 line was moved to DEP. Located in Dearborn, Michigan.
