The honour of the rarest Corvette of all time rests with...

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The honour of the rarest production Corvette of all time rests with the 1969 Corvette ZL1...the next step up from the legendary L88. Two were sold. Only two. The US$4,718.00 ZL1 option essentially 'doubled' the price of the car, before adding in the cost of other options. That's pretty astounding when you consider that the base price of the 1969 coupe was US$4,781.00. After adding in the ZL1 option, and all the other items chosen, this car listed for an eye-popping (for the era) US$10,771.00 However, this car (and the other ZL1) is the highest performance ever-achieved in big-block factory production, for public sale.

Keep in mind, this was all accomplished by brute force. No fuel-injection. No computerization. No turbo-charging. No super-charging. Just a big ol' Holley 4bbl carb. Now, it's a dinosaur, but don't we all stand in awe when a T-Rex stomps down our street? I know I do.

Currently, the ZL1 outlined in the following article is owned by Roger Judski of Roger's Corvettes in Florida. Back in April of 1982, when this was published, it was owned by Wayne Walker of ZIP Products.













And, this is how it ended up with Roger Judski.


But, that's a story for another time.

 

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“The ZL-1 doesn’t just accelerate because the word accelerate is inadequate for this car. It tears its way through the air and across the black payment like all the modern big-inch racing machines you have ever seen, the engine climbing the rev band in that kind of leaping gate as the tires hunt for traction, find it, lose it again for a milli-second, then find it until they are locked in.”
Eric Dahlquist,
Motor Trend magazine, May 1969

 

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The only other documented ZL1 Corvette is owned by Kevin Suydam, a well-known collector of all kinds of performance cars.
His white ZL1 was delivered with very different striping from Judski's yellow ZL1.

 

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427 big-block ZL1 aluminium: top to bottom; front to rear.