Suprisingly, the valve covers are a piece of cake to remove on the LS1. The valve cover gasket is rubber and is reusable. It's a lot easier if you remove the coil packs and then remove the cover but you can pull the valve covers with the coil packs still attached. It's just a pain in the *** due to clearance. Last time I checked new pushrods from GM were something like $12 a piece! You can generally get a set of hardened pushrods for much less but then you run the risk of bending valves before pushrods the next time you over rev the engine.

The first time I pulled the pushrods to check them, it only took about a half hour per side to remove, check, and reinstall.

To check for a bent rod just roll the rods on a mirror or other piece of glass to see if it rolls smoothly.

You'll want to check me on this, but I think I recall that the torque spec on the rocker arms is 22 ft-lbs and something really small on the valve cover bolts. Be extremely careful with the valve cover bolts as they are an aluminum or almost plastic material and are really easy to snap off. The torque for these it small enough to be measure in inch-lbs.