Grudge Match Gladiators: John O’Malley

If you followed the world of extreme sports back in the earlier 2000s, the name John O’Malley may be familiar, as he competed in the 2008 Winter X Games in snowcross along with being an accomplished motocross rider. Today, O’Malley runs Boosted Motorsports and is known across social media for his array of cool, mostly SRT® Hellcat-swapped Mopar® vehicles, but come August 9th, he will be one of the Hurricane Grudge Match competitors at Roadkill Nights Powered by Dodge, racing in a Dodge Viper.

This is not the first Dodge Viper that we have seen in the Roadkill Nights Grudge Match over the years, but this is almost certainly the most unique Viper that has graced RKN. O‘Malley has a red and silver 2000 Dodge Viper ACR and in hunting around online, it looks like the company only made 218 ACR models for 2000, but less than 30 of those were finished in red with silver stripes. In short, even as Vipers go, this car is pretty rare, but when he is done with his build, it will definitely be a one-of-one.

Like all of the vehicles in the 2025 Roadkill Nights Powered by Dodge Grudge Match, John O’Malley’s Dodge Viper will be powered by the Hurricane 3.0-liter twin turbocharged inline-six engine mated to a ZF 8HP75 automatic transmission. As a result, this will be the first Dodge Viper to feature the Hurricane engine along with possibly being the first Viper in the world to be equipped with any inline-six engine or any 8-speed automatic transmission. Needless to say, the Viper community isn’t likely to love this build, as the V10 engine and a manual transmission are the two key features that have always been a part of the legendary American supercar. However, we expect that with six cylinders, this build will be markedly quicker than it was with the stock V10.

John O’Malley’s 2000 Dodge Viper ACR will be built for the Roadkill Nights Grudge Match at his shop, Boosted Motorsports, and we have a few of the basic details beyond the engine and transmission. O’Malley told us that he will be cutting the hood to show off the inline-six and the turbo – suggesting that the engine might be modified to a single turbo setup when this Viper arrives in Metro Detroit in August. As a reminder, this year’s Grudge Match is an outlaw class, so the competitors are allowed to do pretty much whatever they want to the car and engine, so long as they are using the Hurricane engine platform.

A stock 2000 Dodge Viper ACR weighs around 3,400 lbs in stock form, packing 460 horsepower and 490 lb-ft of torque. The Hurricane high output engine in its stock form makes around 550 horsepower and 521 lb-ft of torque, so before making any changes, the added power of the stock I6 alone will make the car much quicker, but should he swap to a single turbo and work on the tuning, this 2000 Viper is likely going to move like few others from its era. We are very excited to see just how well John O’Malley’s Dodge Viper runs when the Hurricane Grudge Match kicks off at Roadkill Nights 2025 on August 9th.

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