When it comes to strip-slaying credentials, “Mopar or no car” appears to be the way to go. As opposed to the Ford Motor Company and General Motors, the Dodge Challenger remains the go-to drag racer thanks to HEMI power.
The R/T is the most affordable V8 option in the lineup, but the free-breathing engine to have is the 392 that retails from $39,995. The question is, how does the 6.4-liter motor stack up against the awe-inspiring Hellcat?
Drag Racing and Car Stuff has the answer to that question in the guise of two runs over the blacktop at Kil-Kare Raceway. Thanks to more wheel spin than a Vegas roulette table, the Challenger T/A 392 crosses the line ahead of the Hellcat. The rematch didn’t fare well for the supercharged contender either, even though the 707-hp sibling posted a higher trap speed.
Only on the third try did the Hellcat get revenge. 12.32 seconds at 112.56 miles per hour (181.15 kph) is pretty good for what appears to be a bone-stock vehicle. On the other hand, Dodge quotes 11.2 seconds at 125 miles per hour (201.17 kph) with Pirelli P-Zero tires or 10.8 seconds at 126 miles per hour (202.78 kph) with drag radials. As for the fourth showdown against the T/A 392, the Hellcat can’t do better than 13 seconds, losing to the free-breathing rival’s 12.87s at 111 mph (178.64 kph).
Next up, the gentleman in the Hellcat duked it out with an S197 generation Ford Mustang GT with drag radials. Although they couldn’t be more different, the pony car finishes the quarter-mile run in 12.36 seconds while the muscle car posted 12.6 seconds. Finally, the final race pits the supercharged coupe against a sixth-generation Chevrolet Camaro SS that appears fully stock. 12.21 versus 12.58 seconds is a pretty small difference between such different levels of horsepower and torque, don’t you think?
In the right hands and in perfect launching conditions, the Super Stock is the Challenger to have for the 2021 model year. Half Hellcat and half Demon, the newest addition to the lineup comes with street-legal drag radials from the factory. As such, the Super Stock is “the world’s quickest and most powerful muscle car” at 10.5 seconds at 131 mph (210.82 kph) and 807 horsepower.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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