This Corvette will be the pace car at the Indy 500 — and we drove it (GM)

By: Business Insider

May 24, 2017 at 14:25 PM EDT

Corvette Grand Sport I'm not going to get into the long and illustrious history of the Chevrolet Corvette, in continuous production since the 1950s and now into its seventh generation. You can look it up.

Suffice it to say that we really, really like Vettes. The C7 Stingray was our 2014 Business Insider Car of the Year. It set a whole new standard for this most American of vehicles (still bolted together with patriotic care in beautiful Bowling Green, Kentucky).

Since we got behind the wheel of the glorious Stingray with a seven-speed manual transmission, we've sampled the same car in a convertible version with an automatic — and outfitted with Apple CarPlay — and taken a rocket-ship ride on the supercar-defying Zo6, a 650-horsepower monster of a machine.

We thought we'd seen it all, Vette-wise. And then an Arctic White 2017 Corvette Grand Sport Convertible paid us a brief visit. Too brief — we had it for only about a day and a half. But we lucked out on the weather in the Northeast before some harsh winter conditions set in, as you can see from our sunsplashed photos.

The GS is now moving up in the world. "The Corvette Grand Sport is the official pace car for the 2017 Indianapolis 500 and will lead drivers to the green flag on May 28 for the 101st running of the legendary race," Chevy said in a statement.

"It marks the 14th time a Corvette has served as the official pace car, starting in 1978, and the 28th time a Chevrolet has led the field, dating back to 1948. No other vehicle has served as the pace car more than the Corvette."

That milestone aside, few cars available right now are this good. And no others are this good for a base price of about $70,000. Ours stickered at $85,910, and it was nicely appointed (the "Black Suede Design Package" alone added four grand).

Here's what we thought when we paced the official 2017 Indy 500 pace car:

Here's what the Vette looks like in the colors it will wear when it leads them around Indy.Chevrolet

And here was our test car. This thing looks great in white!Matthew DeBord/BI

The seventh generation of Corvettes was inaugurated by the exquisite Stingray and its 460-horsepower V8.General Motors

Read the review here, as well as our 2014 Car of the Year commendation.

We later sampled the convertible version and got a taste of how happy the Vette's engine is when paired with an automatic transmission. It's actually FASTER than with the manual.Matthew DeBord/Business Insider

We tested out Apple CarPlay on this Vette.

Then cometh the almighty Z06, a 650-horsepower beast — and easily the best value in supercars on the planet.Matthew DeBord/Business Insider

Read the review here.

See the rest of the story at Business Insider