John Fitch started from the pole at Sebring, but a major question loomed: How long would the Corvette SS last? Photography Credit: Peter Brock


To demonstrate Chevrolet’s full commitment to competition, the company also entered its SR-2 racer at Sebring that year. Photography Credit: Peter Brock

When the gleaming-blue SS finally arrived two days before the race, the impending situation became as electric as the car’s beautiful surface. After seeing the now grubby, well-used mule for more than a week, the contrast was incredible.

The finished SS was a piece of automotive art worthy of space in any of GM’s previous Motorama show-car spectacles. Instead of the initial curious interest generated by the mule and its less than impressive performance, the motorsports media was entranced. Photographers and enthusiasts surrounded the spectacular SS whenever it was brought trackside.

One of those admirers was a young GM designer: I was just 19 when I was hired by GM Design in 1956.

While working in Research StudioB at GM Styling, I kept hearing the rumors of a new racing Corvette being prepared to run at Sebring. The project was so secret that no one not directly associated with it was allowed to see it.

I and three other design buddies decided to drive two new Corvette Fuelies down to Florida to check out the action. To minimize the time we’d be away from work, we drove around the clock from Michigan to Sebring.

The Fuelies were fast but extremely uncomfortable. Between driving stints, it wasn’t possible to get any rest in the passenger seat. It didn’t matter. We were young and couldn’t wait to get to one of the most famous tracks in America to watch a car that had been designed, and was being run, by the company we worked for.

The SS may not have had the speed its appearance indicated, but it didn’t matter; its mere appearance was striking. All who gazed upon Earl and Zora’s sleek racer seemed to believe that it might indeed be faster than the impressive surrounding competition from the fastest teams in the world.

The first morning test for the SS, a day before the race, brought an entirely new and unexpected problem: cockpit heat. The magnesium body acted as a heat sponge. Even Sebring’s brilliant morning sun warmed the alloy body to the point where it was uncomfortable to touch.

Fitch took it out for a couple of laps to see if it was suitable for competition and immediately came back in to quietly reveal to Zora that the cockpit was simply too hot to drive! Even worse, the engine was overheating. The mule had run cool in testing, and removing Earl’s chromed Corvette grille immediately revealed it to be the source of the problem.

By Earl’s previous instruction, any exterior changes to the SS’s appearance would require a call back to him at the Tech Center to get approval. He had been adamant that nothing on the car’s exterior could be removed or even changed.

This raised some important questions: How could engine cooling be improved, not to mention the serious problem with cockpit heat? In the end, not much could be done to make the SS race-worthy. The grille had to be left in, the brakes were useless, and the driver was being cooked inside the cockpit. Its sole value was in its startling appearance and obvious potential–provided a solid development program, with disc brakes, would ever occur.

Fitch and Zora resolved to put on as good a show as possible. With the SS having the largest engine in the race, it was positioned on the grid with a large numeral 1 on the nose. Fitch started the race and used Cole’s fuel-injected V8 to stay with the leaders for the first lap. It made for some impressive photos, but there was no hope. Fitch drove a few laps, then came in to hand over to Taruffi so a few more photos could be taken. The SS was withdrawn from the race after 23 laps. The official reason given was the failing of a small bushing in the car’s rear suspension. In the end, even the SS’s spectacular presence at Sebring worked against all that Earl and Zora had worked and hoped for.