The last time we looked, Nissan was claiming a 7m 26.7s Nurburgring lap time for its 2010 ‘Series II’ GT-R, while General Motors was boasting an even better time of 7m 22.4 seconds for its Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 supercar. While manufacturer claims should be taken with a grain of salt--there are just too many variables that can affect the lap times--when an independent magazine runs the tests, with both cars on the same day, the results are usually worth a mention.

In this case the tests were run by German magazine Auto Sport, with current editor and former race driver Horst von Saurma behind the wheel. Saurma, incidentally, held the ‘Ring record for a production car with a time of 7m 32s in a Porsche Carrera GT for several years.

So what was the magic number? According to the tests, both the GT-R and Corvette ZR1 achieved a lap time of 7m 38s around the treacherous 13-mile Nordschliefe course.

2009 Nissan GT-R

2009 Nissan GT-R

Hard to believe considering the differences between the cars: one, an all-wheel drive turbocharged V-6 with 480 horsepower and 430 pound-feet of torque and a hefty curb weight of 3,800 pounds, and the other, a supercharged V-8 with 638 horsepower and a monstrous 604 pound-feet of torque in a chassis weighing just 3,352 pounds. Note that the first series 2009 Nissan GT-R with slightly less power and softer suspension than the 2010 model was used.

The story doesn’t end there as other tracks were also compared in the German test, the ZR1 beating out the GT-R’s Hockenheimring laptime (1m 09.7s to the GT-R’s 1m 10.7s) and then the ZR1 losing out to the GT-R in the wet handling course (1m 36.8s to the GT-R’s 1m 32.4s).

We’ll leave you to come up with a conclusion in the comments section below.

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