Shelby Cobra Killers: When GM Built One in Secret and Backed Another in the Shadows

During the golden era of the American automotive industry in the 1950s and 1960s, Ford and Chevrolet were locked in an arms race for sports car and racing supremacy. Chevrolet introduced the Corvette in 1953, and less than a decade later, a year before the launch of the C2 Corvette, there was a new kid on the block: the Ford-powered Shelby Cobra. Right off the bat, the Cobra was quicker than any Corvette on the road. Thanks to its huge power-to-weight advantage, short wheelbase, and massive torque, the Shelby Cobra was essentially a race car with license plates.

When the Cobra appeared in 1962, GM found itself in an awkward position. First, the C2 Corvette wasn’t ready yet, which meant Chevrolet was still racing an aging C1. As a result, the Cobra immediately began beating Corvettes in SCCA competition. However, due to GM’s self-imposed racing ban, the company could not openly fight the Cobra. Instead, it triggered a wave of covert, semi-official “Cobra Killer” programs, some inside GM and others adjacent to it, designed to beat the Shelby Cobra without violating GM’s corporate racing ban.