Hellcat Challenger Races Tesla in 1/4 mile Rematch
The 2015 Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat driver who lost horribly to the new Tesla S P85D a few months back has gotten his rematch. This time around the 707 horsepower muscle car handed the world’s quickest Electric Car a good beating. At the beginning of the year, the internet exploded with talk of the electric Tesla P85D romping on the new Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat. The world of electric car enthusiasts insisted that the video showing a well driven Tesla beating a very badly driven Challenger Hellcat was proof that the electric performance car world had finally taken the lead on the traditional combustion engine segment. However, anyone who knows anything about the performance world could watch that video and see that it wasn’t the Tesla beating the Hellcat. Rather it was the Tesla driver beating the Hellcat driver. Face it, most people can not handle 707 horsepower their first time around.
Well fortunately for the driver of the Sublime Green Hellcat Challenger was determined to defend the muscle car world. He spent the past few weeks practicing at the drag strip and bought himself a good set of drag radials. As a result, he is now able to get his 707 horsepower Dodge Hellcat Challenger into the expected 10 second range. Upon getting the experience needed to turn in a respectable quarter mile time, the Hellcat owner put out the call for a rematch and that rematch happened, with another video showing the two high horsepower beasts going head to head at the drag strip.
The video below shows a quarter mile drag race between the same 2015 Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat and 2015 Tesla S P85D that we saw race back in January. The Hellcat has the supercharged 6.2L Hellcat Hemi with 707 horsepower and 650lb-ft of torque to the rear wheels via a quick shifting 8-speed automatic transmission. As you can hear in the video the Hellcat shifts several times helping it achieve quick acceleration. The electric powered Tesla S P85D has two drive units, one over each axle giving it a combined output of 691 horsepower and 687lb-ft of torque with all-wheel drive. In this video the all-wheel drive Tesla is factory stock, while the 707hp Hellcat Challenger is equipped with stickier drag radials.
When the green lights drop, the all-wheel drive Tesla jumps out to a very small lead, but the Hellcat stays right with the electric powered sedan. As the two cars race away from the camera, we can see on the big boards that the Dodge actually pulled a better 60 foot time with rear wheel drive, although it looks as though the driver of P85D had a better reaction time.
The race is close enough the whole way down the quarter mile that it is hard to see who has the lead on the big end, but when the time and speed for the left lane pops up first, we see that the Mopar muscle car won the rematch race. In the end, the Challenger was a bit slower than his previous bests, running 11.28 at 122.42mph, but it was enough to comfortably beat the Tesla which still made a very respectable quarter mile time of 11.91 at 111mph, which was about 3 tenths off his previous best time. However, even if the P85D made its previously record 11.60 run, it wouldn’t have been enough to outrun the Hellcat Challenger
Now that it is has been clearly proven that driver experience makes all the difference and that with two good drivers, the Hellcat Challenger will beat up the electric powered Tesla S P85D on the quarter mile. But in the end the Tesla deserves respect for being the quickest production electric car in the world.
