Before the C8 Corvette, Chevy spent decades playing with mid-engine designs

For a sports car that has been front-engine and rear-drive for over 60 years, it can seem a bit surprising that the C8 Chevy Corvette is switching to a mid-engine layout. CERV I, the first part of which stands for Chevrolet Engineering Research Vehicle, is where Chevy's mid-engine adventures began. It was shown in 1960 and was developed with Zora Arkus-Duntov at the helm, and according to Chevy, was really designed to learn about developing extremely high-performance cars that will experience high stresses and potentially unusual reactions compared with normal cars.