The Grand Sport is one of America's most famous racecars and represented the state-of-the-art in American road racing for it's time. The number 1 car (first of five Grand Sport racecars designed and developed by Chevrolet) Chassis 001 was converted to a muscle roadster after the GM Board of Directors withdrew direct support for the Chevrolet racing program. This fantastic roadster was later sold to Roger Penske and was raced at Sebring in 1966.

Near the end of the 1950s there was a non-racing agreement that was entered into by the American automobile manufacturers (big three) and no factory support for racing was the result of this agreement. Some would-be fantastic legends were abandoned due to this agreement, but in 1962 Ford began supporting Carroll Shelby's race program, which began changing the lack of support by the big three.

The father of the Corvette, Zora Arkus-Duntov, approached GM executives for approval to create a monster that would compete with Shelby’s Cobra’s. From that design the Grand Sport would be born. Five cars were built and given to privateers for the sole purpose to dominate the racing circuit.  The Grand Sport soon challenged the dominant Cobras at the 1963 Nassau Speed Week. Similar to a Corvette Coupe, the fiberglass predator was destined to become a strong competitor with a 327 cubic-inch engine that produced 360 horsepower. To ensure dominance the next step was to install an aluminum 500 horsepower V8 engine into the Grand Sport, this led to the birth of a legend by proving to be a “Cobra Killer” the Cobra’s no longer dominated and a rivalry was born.

The Grand Sport’s were prepped and ready for the 1964 Daytona and Sebring races, but unfortunately GM halted the project. The Grand Sports were not raced and were sold to privateers who continued to campaign the “Cobra Killers” in various racing circuits. One of the more famous of the drivers, Roger Penske, defended the Nassau GT Victory by repeating in 1964.