Rambunctious Dodge Challenger SRT® Hellcat Redeye
4 years ago Gallery Reviews
In the era of COVID-19 and self-quarantine, with four walls coming closer every day, it’s nice to get behind the wheel of a high-performance automobile and just drive. If your destination is the NHRA U.S. Nationals at Indianapolis Raceway Park, the road trip just got a whole lot better. Our flight plan took us from the Motor City, across the flat farmlands of Michigan and Ohio, to the crossroads of America: Indianapolis. Our mode of transportation was a 2020 Dodge Challenger SRT® Hellcat Redeye Widebody. With 797 horsepower under its dual snorkel scooped hood, the SRT Hellcat Redeye shrunk time and distance as we struggled to fight the urge to constantly stomp the gas pedal and listen to the banshee screams of the supercharger mounted on top of its glorious 6.2-liter HEMI® V8 engine. You learn very quickly to respect this machine, capable of high ten-second quarter-mile times in its as-delivered form while rolling on stock Pirelli tires. The car can be your travelling companion or scare you to death. It all depends on how you treat this ravenous SRT Hellcat Redeye addicted to premium unleaded.
Don’t think for a minute this is a bare-bones, race-only machine. The Challenger SRT Hellcat Redeye Widebody has more luxurious leather appointments than some five-star hotel rooms. The interior is just as rich as European supercars and the Alcantara steering wheel feels like you’re driving an F1 car. Scroll through the SRT Pages and you can tune the suspension and driveline for a myriad of road and track conditions, whether you’re in the mood to carve corners on canyon roads or blast down the drag strip. The SRT Hellcat Redeye may share the heart of a Challenger SRT Demon, but these two unique Challengers have been placed on this earth for different purposes.
In the sound department, this particular Challenger SRT Hellcat Redeye Widebody was optioned with the 18-speaker Harman Kardon® Audio Group that comes with a subwoofer hiding in the trunk. The intense sounds drowned out the gurgling low-speed exhaust tone when we turned up the volume. The bass just went “thump…thump…thump” when listening to Snoop Dogg or Wiz Khalifa as the rear glass vibrated. However, on some classic rock songs that were recorded when the original Challenger came out in 1970, the bass quality quickly diminishes to more of a thud. The sound was more like that scene in Goodfellas when Billy Batts is locked in the trunk and is frantically pounding on the decklid to get out. If only Billy was in a Challenger, he could’ve pulled the luminated child-safety latch and escaped and not met his demise at the hands DeNiro, Pesci and Liotta.
If we had one complaint about the Challenger SRT Hellcat Redeye Widebody, it would be that everyone stares or takes pictures and videos of the car while they drift into our lane. Fellow motorists in lesser cars roll up next to the SRT Hellcat Redeye wanting to race. Then, for no reason at all, they punch their gas pedal and slowly disappear into the horizon only to jam on their brakes. It must be some spell the SRT Hellcat Redeye casts on other drivers that provoke them to challenge us – but we have nothing to prove. The Challenger SRT Hellcat Redeye Widebody will run 0-60 mph in 3.4 seconds, will cover the quarter-mile in 10.8 seconds at 131 mph in the traps, and if there’s enough real estate on the track for the SRT Hellcat Redeye to stretch its paws, it can top out at over 200 mph. Besides, Dodge was named the “#1 Brand in Initial Quality,” making it the first domestic brand ever to rank #1 in the J.D. Power Initial Quality Study (IQS).
Even with Top Fuel Dragsters, Funny Cars and Challenger Drag Paks, the SRT Hellcat Redeye was at home among the fast machines at the NHRA U.S. Nationals. After all, they’re all powered by a supercharged HEMI engine in one form or another that’s been blazing the drag strip for over 50 years. We even had a chance to hang with the iconic HEMI engine-powered 1968 Super Stock Darts and Barracudas during the running of the Dodge HEMI Challenge at the U.S. Nationals. With the power and performance packed into our SRT Hellcat Redeye, the future for Dodge’s Brotherhood of Muscle looks stronger than ever. Check out these pics of our “Rambunctious Redeye” in the pits at Indianapolis Raceway Park.
