True Chevy fans feel the hair rise up on their arms when they see that little “SS” logo stitched onto the seats of a vehicle. SS stands for Super Sport, and when you see it, that indicates a vehicle has undergone some pretty fun performance boosting. Some standard features to expect with an SS vehicle include high-performance tires, heavy-duty suspension, incredible horsepower, impressive (read: racetrack-ready) acceleration, and other performance and design upgrades. The SS has always been Chevy’s way of establishing its place in the world of performance vehicles. Now, Chevy has announced their Blazer EV will receive those exciting little letters when it arrives at your local Chevy dealer.
In the meantime, you might want to learn why there’s so much hype around this new SS vehicle. Entire fan forums are dedicated to finding the car. To many, it’s like a unicorn, a hybrid of several great features but never seen out in the real world. However, Chevy has been making it very clear lately that they’re dedicated to new and exciting changes (and the revival of old beloved concepts). So it’s no surprise that they have decided to deliver their popular Chevy Blazer in not just an electric version but also in an SS offering. Let’s take a look at some of the history of this designation and what’s to come.
The SS Is a Super Star
Some of Chevy’s greatest vehicles have been honored with the SS boost. You’ll recognize an SS vehicle because it will have the distinctive lettering on the outside of the car and stitched into the seats. The Malibu, Camaro, El Camino, Monte Carlo, Cobalt, and Nova have all come in SS varieties throughout the years for limited periods of time. The SS has even had its time on the silver screen! A 2014 Chevrolet SS appeared in Sharknado 3, as well as in Shooter and Agent X. The Chevrolet SS has been in several car shows, including Extreme Car Concepts and Tooned. There have been many times a show or movie needed a head-turning sports car, and an SS was there.
The very first Chevy to receive the level of SS was a 1957 Corvette race car prototype. That didn’t go to market but was there to let consumers know that Chevy was entering the sports car game. The 1961 Impala was the first SS vehicle available for sale.
Not many know this, but the SS actually came from GM’s Australian company. In the great country of Australia, GM has gone by the name of Holden. Only in 2021 did GM finally consume Holden, and now even Australian drivers know the company by its parent name of GM. However, when it was Holden, the company made a very popular car called the VF Commodore, a rear-wheel drive sedan with either a V6 or V8 engine. The car was so popular, in fact, that GM decided to bring it to the United States and rebrand it as their SS car. Ironically, it feels like part of the fabric of American history now, but it did originate in the land down under.
The One That Got Away
There’s always been a little mystery and exclusivity around Chevy SS vehicles. The truth is that Chevy hasn’t always achieved the major sales they expected with their SS offerings. One example of this would be the Chevy SS Sedan released in 2014. The family-sized car could go from zero to 60 in less than five seconds and really broke the mold for its body type. Chevy hoped to sell well over 10,000 units per year of this car but only wound up selling about 3,000 a year and stopped making it. But not because it wasn’t a great car––simply because word didn’t get out about it. The marketing wasn’t there.
Back in 2003, Chevy briefly put out a concept car simply named the SS. It was a sporty little two-door coupe with a V8 engine and 430 horsepower. It was only on display at car shows and never put on the market for drivers, and it disappeared quickly. Like many of our world’s greatest artists, word about the SS didn’t catch fire until it was too late. Or maybe it isn’t. After all, the Camaro has an SS set of trims to help tailor it for more high performance.
Many thought the SS designation would remain one seen only on sports cars until Chevy shocked the world by releasing one little teaser video in March of 2022. In the video, you can spot the SS logo, the Chevy Blazer, and a charging port. That tells us one very exciting thing: the Chevy Blazer is coming to us in a souped-up SS version, and it will be electric.
Here’s What We Know
GM has been quite vocal for some time now about going fully electric in the coming years, and it looks like they’ll be executing on that with their two-row mid-size crossover Chevy Blazer. We should expect the car by Spring of 2023, according to Chevy’s own announcement, and we can look forward to the full official reveal of the vehicle by the end of 2022. This will officially be the very first electric high-performance Chevy vehicle to don the SS logo. We also know that GM has been putting all of their new EV vehicles on their Ultium vehicle platform and powering them with the Ultium battery cells for better range and performance, so we can look forward to that tech in the Blazer.
What We Don’t Know
We haven’t been able to track down any pricing information yet. However, we’ve seen the trend of electric vehicles costing more than their gas-consuming siblings. And the Blazer is among one of Chevy’s higher-end SUVs, so we are anticipating a somewhat higher price tag than some of their smaller, gas-guzzling cars. Plus, if you want to upgrade to the Blazer SS, we suggest preparing to pay close to the top MSRP for the trim.
We also aren’t fully sure what the final design is going to be. While there have definitely been some promising videos and generation images of the Blazer EV SS, we can only hope that it’s going to look as sleek and cool as they are saying. We also don’t have any performance numbers for range estimates for this EV yet, so while we want to assume it’s going to be fast and have a long range, only time will tell if it can go tire-to-tire against the current market competitors like the Mustang Mach-E.
Planet-Friendly Performance
For now, we’re continually impressed with how Chevy repeatedly breaks cars out of their usual boxes and shows that almost anything is possible when a company is dedicated to making fuel-efficient, performance-driven vehicles. We’re excited about this trend of turning the notoriously fuel-inefficient SUV into an electric vehicle that’s better for the planet and saves money at the pump. Plus, we just can’t wait to get behind the wheel of the EV Chevy Blazer SS and feel its power.
Chevy has withheld the intriguing and beloved SS from drivers for some time now. It’s popped on and off the market many times, always there just long enough to build interest but not long enough to build sales. Hopefully, this time, the SS will be here to stay. We think it will be.
