Jim Mero Ran a 7:04 at Nurburgring in the C7 Corvette ZR1
Mero has shared the time for the Corvette ZR1 on the Facebook account of his new business, having retired from General Motors.
Chevrolet has never announced an official Nurburgring Nordschleife lap time for the C7 Corvette ZR1, but we know that the company spent time testing the 755-horsepower supercar on the legendary German road course. Fortunately, Corvette test driver and engineer Jim Mero has retired from General Motors and announced his best lap time in the new ZR1 on “The Ring” as part of a new business venture.
That time is a 7:04, which is slower than many people expected and that could be why Chevrolet has not officially announced that time for the C7 ZR1. It is still the best lap time by any Corvette, Chevrolet or GM product, but it is slower than the best-recorded lap time for the Dodge Viper and several key competitors in the modern supercar world.
Mero’s New Venture
Since retiring from General Motors, where he set a handful of Nurburgring lap time records in C6 Corvette, Jim Mero has started a new business called Jim Mero Vehicle Dynamics. That company is currently offering upgrades for 2010 through 2013 Corvettes, but to showcase Mero’s experience, his new company’s Facebook page has a gallery with pictures and times of his best Nurburgring lap times in various Corvettes.
Within the “Jim’s Nurburgring Lap Times” gallery, you will find pictures and lap times for the 2008 Z06, the 2009 ZR1, the 2012 Z06, the 2012 ZR1, a 2014 Z51, a tuned 2015 Z06, a 2017 Grand Sport and the 2019 ZR1, several of which we have included here. The big news of this group is the ZR1, as Mero reports a best lap time of 7:04, but he points out that he had to start the lap with cold tires.
The 7:04 Lap
There is also a comment on that picture from Mero stating that he will talk more about the lap time at the upcoming National Corvette Museum Bash, but for now, we know that the man who turned in many of the best times by Corvettes on the Nurburgring ran a 7:04 in the C7 ZR1.
As mentioned above, that is the best time around the 12.9-mile Nordschleife by a Corvette, but the majority of people who care about Nurburgring lap times expected the LT5-powered supercar to run in the 6-minute range. Had Mero run that 7:04 lap with properly-heated tires, he could have been in the 6-minute range, but since he did not, there is still no American production car to reach that plateau.
