This is the greatest Corvette ever - and it's only $70,000 (GM)

By: Business Insider

February 20, 2017 at 10:59 AM EST

Matthew DeBord/BI

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 7-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 half. But we lucked out on the weather in the Northeast, before some harsh winter conditions set in.

There aren't too many cars available right now that are this good. And there are none that 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:

For starters, 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.

A little history. The original Grand Sport Corvettes were created by the car's first chief engineer, Zora Arkus-Duntov, in 1963. They were intended to be race cars, designed to run in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.Matthew DeBord/BI

See the rest of the story at Business Insider