So I flew to Chicago, picked it up, hooked up the HVAC vacuum lines, and drove the 800 miles back to New York City. The first order of business was equipping it with a security system. Next up was reinstalling the air conditioning, and a buddy donated a complete kit. After a couple days' worth of work in Werner's garage and a recharge, we were good to go. This Z was all ready for its first track day, but I had little faith in the auto trans. During the trip to the East Coast, it would only handle about 80 percent throttle before slipping and zinging the LS1 to redline. I was hoping to get at least a passable acceleration time out of the old girl, but that didn't happen. The trans was too far gone when I tried a couple of quarter-mile runs, so a T56 swap was completed ("Trans-ition," May '07).
Finally able to rev to redline and now banging my own gears, the next trip to Englishtown was much more fruitful, resulting in several low 13-second runs, with a best of 13.08 at 109.52. This time was helped by the Spec 3+ clutch and its lightweight options, but was hindered by the fact that either the master cylinder or the shifter needed to be adjusted before I could smoothly powershift the car-all in all, a decent baseline.
LS1 F-bodies are no slouch in the braking department, and with our Stalker radar gun hooked up and recording on E-town's surface, the 1SC averaged 144 feet from 60-0, and 436 feet from 100-0.
But the high point of the day was negotiating Raceway Park's 1.35-mile, 13-turn road course-a task this 1SC was built for. After getting some pointers from road course vet Evan Smith and SCCA Instructor and new Super Chevy Associate Editor Thomas Lyman, I felt confident enough to take a few hot laps. Though the suspension and tires definitely left something to be desired (as did the driver), I was able to lap the course in 1:36 and change. A couple of weeks later, I knocked that number down to a 1:33.4-as good a baseline as any.
For dyno numbers, I traveled to TT Performance Parts in Passaic Park, New Jersey (973/365-2270), and strapped the Z to the rollers, eager to see what kind of power it was putting down. The Dynojet spit back 317.6 horses and 339.1 ft-lb of torque, SAE.
This is a great little Z with lots of snot, and I can't wait to start modding it. In lieu of a detailed explanation of how I'm going to build it up, I'll simply say this: My goals are to improve on these performance numbers, and have a hell of a lot of fun in the process. Stay tuned.
Baseline drag testing took place on October 3, 2006, at Raceway Park. There is a good amount of wheelhop with the stock suspension, but this six-speed Z managed a best of 13.08 at 109 and change, with worn 245/50-16 Michelin Pilots. |  | 
With huge LS1 torque and a lighter curb weight than many of its siblings, this hardtop Z really shines on the road course. Though there are many areas that will need to be addressed for reliable road course use, I was able to put together several decent laps over the course of two days, culminating in a 1:33.4 time around Englishtown's technical 1.35-mile road course. |