Hoonigan Asks if the Corvette is the ‘Perfect Reliable Drift Car?’

500 WHP LS2, Carbon-Kevlar body, full Parts Shop Max suspension. Can you believe this is Drift Pro driver Matt Field’s practice C6?

Once every year,  Lone Star Drift hosts “Drift Week” where 13  professional drift drivers travel from Texas to California, competing in challenges and drift events along the way. Veteran racing driver and Corvette enthusiast Matt Field, who piloted a C6 during the 2018-2019 Formula Drift season, joined this year’s Drift Week with his personal C6 drift car.

Field build this C6 strictly as a “fun” drift car. He also has a C5 just as a “beater.” As you would expect, professional drivers’ idea of a beater is very different from ours, but that’s the whole point, isn’t it? Larry Chen, the host of Hoonigan AutoFocus, makes a good point, “LS swaps are a dime a dozen…why separate the motor from the original car.” We couldn’t agree more with Mr. Chen, not when C6 Corvettes look this good going sideways.

While the C6 ran nearly perfect for the whole week, Field ended up blowing up the torque tube mid-drift at one of the events. The impact from the explosion was so intense,t the force broke the shifter in half and sent it flying into his radio. Thankfully he didn’t have his hand on the shifter at the time. That would have been a pretty unpleasant experience. Thanks to some overnight parts and a good set of hands, the team managed to fix the torque tube issue in short three hours.

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While this car’s purpose is to shred tires at any given moment, Field kept the build simple and reliable. Remember, the car has to be street driven to and from the events. Texas to California isn’t exactly close. Field drove around 2,500 miles over the course of the week. Thus, the car still retains full interior, cruise control, power windows, you name it. The only creature comfort removed from the car was the A/C. This is because it can get in the way of required maintenance if the car had major issues. According to Field, this drift Corvette is “a little bit loud, but realistically not bad” as a road trip car. Supposedly, it even averages 20 mpg on cruise control.

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If your idea of a road trip car also carries a 500 WHP Texas Speed-built LS2, then you and Mr. Field probably will get along just fine. This engine is beyond built to take 100% throttle all day and Field prefers a setup like this because it’s “less work, more driving.” Not to mention, all the take-off parts from his competition car get passed down to this one, meaning some serious capability for this “fun” car. Nothing wrong with “recycling from the race car” when the parts are this good! Do you have a bad-ass Corvette drift car and would like to be featured on the forum? Send us a message and the next post might be about your car!

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Screengrabs: Hoonigan AutoFocus / YouTube

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