We were at the Bathurst 12 Hour for the Corvette. If you haven’t seen the Z06 in the flesh, doing laps of Mount Panorama at pace, add it to the list. It’s one of those things that recalibrates your sense of what a car actually is. But that’s a story for another day, because on the way there, something else entirely stole the show.
The Chevrolet Silverado 2500 HD. Six metres long, 6.6-litre Duramax turbo-diesel V8 under the bonnet, and 1,322 newton metres of torque on tap. That last number is worth sitting with for a second. Thirteen hundred newton metres. In a ute. The kind of torque figure you normally associate with mining equipment or something pulling a 747 across a tarmac for shits and giggles.
Here’s the thing about the Silverado. It doesn’t pretend to be something it’s not. Every other dual-cab on the market is playing lifestyle. They want to be seen at the school pick-up, on the ski fields, maybe towing a jet ski once a year to justify the towball.
The Silverado looks at all of that and keeps eating. This thing tows up to eight tonnes. Eight. In theory, that’s truck licence territory, which tells you everything you need to know about where this sits in the hierarchy.
Boats. Caravans. Horse floats. Whatever you’ve got, it doesn’t care none.
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Fourteen camera views so you’re not guessing when you’re backing up to a trailer. Which sounds like overkill until you remember this thing is longer than some apartments in Bondi.
Pull up anywhere in it and people notice. Not in a look-at-me sports car way. More like the crowd parts and someone says “what is that” under their breath.
On the drive up to Bathurst we stopped twice and got approached both times. One bloke wanted to know if it was a diesel. Another just stood there and nodded slowly the way men do when they can’t find anything wrong with something. Also the green colour is way too cool.
Is it practical in Sydney? Genuinely, no. But are people buying it? Absolutely.
Parallel parking it is an act of faith and some of the city’s multi-storeys aren’t happening. But that’s not who this is for.
This is for someone with a property, a boat, a caravan, and absolutely no interest in compromising. Someone who needs to move serious weight and doesn’t want three-quarter measures.
Every other dual-cab on the market looks like it’s hovering outside Bunnings waiting for the sausage sizzle to start. The Silverado looks like it built the Bunnings and the bloody pyramids in one day.
It is, without question, heavy-duty authority on wheels. And if you’ve ever looked at a HiLux or a Ranger and thought “close, but not quite,” this could be your answer.
