18 of the Nastiest Pro-Built Chevys Went to War at Auto Club Speedway — A 1972 Corvette Beat Every Camaro in the Field

Eighteen pro-built Chevys, including Camaros, Chevelles, and even a Nova wagon, went head-to-head in a three-discipline shootout at Auto Club Speedway, and the win didn’t go to the car with the biggest motor. A Ridetech-built 1972 Corvette took the trophy, beating an Art Morrison Camaro and a Total Cost Involved Nova wagon to the podium.

Twenty of the biggest names in Chevy performance rolled into Auto Club Speedway with one goal: prove their build was the best all-around street machine in the country, not just the fastest in a straight line. Camaros, Chevelles, Novas, a C2 Corvette, and even a couple of pro-built trucks lined up for a suspension shootout unlike anything else on the calendar. Eighteen cars made the final field, every one of them street-registered, tech-inspected, and locked onto a single spec tire — Falken, no exceptions, no wiggle room. By the time the road course, slalom, and 100-yard sprint were finished, the smart money on a Camaro sweep was dead wrong. A 1972 Corvette built by Ridetech took the win, and the full-episode video below shows exactly how it happened.

This is the full episode from the Super Chevy Muscle Car Challenge presented by Falken Tire, and it covers the entire event from staging lanes to trophy presentation. Eighteen classic Chevys — Camaros, Chevelles, Novas, a Corvette, and a couple of trucks — run three separate tests: a road course to check high-speed composure, a slalom to isolate pure lateral grip, and a 100-yard dash meant to simulate the stoplight-to-stoplight blast every one of these builders actually drives on the street. Every car has to be licensed and insured, every car runs the same spec tire, and the only setup changes allowed between runs are shock settings and tire pressure. That rule alone separates this event from a straight-line drag race — it rewards the car that does everything well, not just the one with the biggest motor under the hood.

The event has moved venues over the years, shifting from Willow Springs to Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California, and it keeps pulling in serious shops every season. The 2019 podium came down to a Ridetech-built 1972 Corvette taking first, an Art Morrison 1968 Camaro finishing second, and a Total Cost Involved 1964 Nova wagon rounding out third — proof that the muscle car crowd doesn’t take chassis tuning and grip any less seriously than horsepower.

⚑ Featured Gear

Start Car Conversations →

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Why a Street-Legal Shootout Beats a Straight Drag Race

Muscle cars were built, marketed, and sold on quarter-mile bragging rights, but that number never told the whole story. A car that runs a blistering 60-foot time and falls apart the first time it sees a corner is a trailer queen with a big engine, not a driver’s car. Events like the Super Chevy Muscle Car Challenge exist specifically to correct for that blind spot: by forcing every entrant onto the same tire and the same three disciplines, the challenge measures the thing a lot of builders spend the most money on and get the least credit for — suspension geometry, chassis stiffness, and brake balance. That’s a big part of why a Corvette beat a field stacked with Camaros: Chevy’s own halo car was engineered around cornering from the factory, and a modern Ridetech chassis underneath only sharpened that advantage.

For a deeper look at what actually separates a numbers-matching survivor from a resto-mod street fighter, our recent piece on a barn-find 1969 Chevelle SS 396 breaks down exactly how collectors and builders weigh originality against performance upgrades — a debate a shootout like this one settles firmly in favor of the builder. You can read that full breakdown here: A Barn-Find 1969 Chevelle SS 396 Just Resurfaced.

The Podium Says More Than the Lap Times

Second place going to an Art Morrison-chassis 1968 Camaro and third to a Total Cost Involved 1964 Nova wagon says as much about this event as the win does. Both of those shops built their reputations on aftermarket chassis and suspension components, not engine work, and both cars finished ahead of a field packed with entries built by teams chasing straight-line numbers. A Nova wagon — not exactly the poster child of muscle car culture — landing on the podium at a nationally covered shootout is the kind of result that only happens when the rulebook forces builders to get serious about handling instead of hiding behind horsepower.

Watch the full episode above to see all 18 cars run the gauntlet, hear which shops leaned hardest into the road course versus the sprint, and get a feel for just how tight the scoring was between first and third. It’s a different kind of muscle car drama than a quarter-mile pass, and arguably a better test of what these builds can actually do.

Watch the full video above and let us know your thoughts in the comments.