Entertainment
Speed Racer: President Biden burns rubber at 118 mph in his Corvette on 'Jay Leno's Garage'
The 79-year-old president let CNBC film him taking his 1967 Corvette Stingray for a cruise on “Jay Leno’s Garage” Wednesday night
October 27, 2022 1:49pm
Updated: February 19, 2023 8:09am
President Joe Biden may have other job opportunities on America’s raceways if he leaves the White House in January 2025.
The 79-year-old president misses driving, and took a rare opportunity to let CNBC film him taking his 1967 Corvette Stingray for a cruise on for a TV segment, which was featured “Jay Leno’s Garage” Wednesday night.
Decked out in a dangerous pair of khakis, a blue Ralph Lauren polo and dark aviator sunglasses, the 46th president drove the 350-horsepower, eight cylinder powered, four-speed manual transmission Corvette in a matchup against Michael Powell’s more powerful automatic 2015 Stingray.
The president and Powell let loose at the James J. Rowley Secret Service training facility in Beltsville, Maryland. Despite getting the classic car up to 118 mph, Powell was able to evade him in the more contemporary Chevy model.
Powell, the son of the late Secretary of State Gen. Colin Powell wanted to race the president after he defeated his father in a similar contest the two elder statemen held on the “Tonight Show” with Leno in 2016.
“I was getting married in August of ’67,” Biden explained. “My dad didn’t have a lot of money but he ran the largest Chevrolet dealership in the state for years. So, there’s 75 people outside the dealership. We pull up, they spread. My dad says, ‘This is my wedding gift.'”
Biden also got a chance to drive an electrified 1978 Ford F-100, which he described was “quiet as hell,” and had “quicker response” than its gas-guzzling counterpart.
“This is the only time you get to drive,” Leno, 72, asked while riding aside Biden in the truck.
“Yeah, it is,” the president said, nostalgically. “It’s the God’s truth, and I miss it.”
The New York Post mused that, “the program was a rare opportunity for Biden to forget polls showing Democrats on course to lose the House of Representatives and Senate in the Nov. 8 midterm elections.”