It’s been a clean sweep for Chevrolet in the North American Car and Truck of the Year awards event, with its 2014 Corvette Stingray sports car receiving top honors in the car category and its 2014 Silverado 1500 pickup receiving the same in the category for trucks and utilities. It is the first time Chevrolet has won both awards in the same year. The Silverado last won the truck category in 2007 while its been since 1998 since a Corvette was picked for the car category.

Finalists in the car category included the 2014 Cadillac CTS and 2014 Mazda 3, while in the truck category the 2014 Acura MDX and 2014 Jeep Cherokee were among the finalists. Some other top contenders were the 2014 BMW 4-Series and X5, 2015 Mercedes-Benz CLA-Class, and the 2014 Land Rover Range Rover Sport. Last year's winners were the Cadillac ATS and Ram 1500.

The announcement of the winners this morning at the 2014 Detroit Auto Show ends weeks of diligent testing of all the nominated vehicles by a panel of 49 judges comprised of automotive journalists from the U.S. and Canada. Among them was our own Marty Padgett.

The judges base their vote on a number of factors including innovation, design, safety, handling, driver satisfaction and value, and to be eligible a vehicle must be completely new or substantially changed from the previous model year. For the car category, the judges gave the Corvette Stingray 211 points; the Mazda 3 got 185 and the Cadillac CTS 94. For the truck category, they gave the Silverado 219 points; the Jeep Cherokee 174 and the Acura MDX 97.

For more from the 2014 Detroit Auto Show, click here.

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