SRT Demon Drags R/T 1320, T/A Challengers; It's a Nine-Second Lesson on HEMI Supercharging

The Challenger is probably the most iconic Dodge name, sharing that honor with the Charger. However, unlike the original Dodge muscle car from six decades ago, the two-door Challenger stayed true to its lineage. When it made its second arrival at the dawn of the millennium, it spurred a massive following precisely because of its strong resemblance to the original model of 1970.

It even carried a HEMI, but not the legendary 426 Elephant of the sixties, but a supercharged 6.2-liter V8 with near-as-makes-no-difference twice as much power as the Hemigod from the Muscle Car age. 840 horses and 770 lb-ft (852 PS, 1,044 Nm), the Demon didn’t just rule the world; it remade it completely.

Even its low-key non-SRT cousins weren’t steering clear from a quarter-mile brawl – instead, they pretty much asked for one out loud. Following a long list of ever-harder-hitting upgrades, in 2019, the R/T Scat Pack 1320 came out. It featured the 6.4-liter HEMI, the naturally-aspirated V8 with 485 horses and 475 lb-ft (491 PS, 644 Nm).

Putting the two toe-to-toe wouldn’t be exactly fair for the bragging quarter-miler since the Demon would absolutely smoke the 1320’s soul right off the line. Thankfully, a wonderful invention called bracket racing made it even by giving the R/T the hit. The Demon leaves two seconds after the lessee Challenger and destroys it.

Not only does it catch up with the runaway 1320, but it completely demolishes it with a three-second lower Elapsed Time. Play the video below, shot by the drag race addicts from the Wheels YouTube channel, and see for yourselves. The Demon clocked in at 9.37 seconds, with a 142-mph trap speed, while the 1320 managed a 12.32, at a lingering 110 mph.

The Las Vegas drag strip saw more than one demonic act, with the yellow Challenger SRT Demon doing the same thing against a T/A – basically the same powerhouse, but without the dragstrip finetuning. The fast Challenger scores 9.38 seconds at 140 mph, while the first-off-the-line T/A punched just above his 1320 cousin with a 12.26 ET at just below 112 mph.

The day concludes with another Challenger-only showdown between the 1320 and an aging SRT8 from the dawn of the third generation in 2008. 425 hp from 6.1 hemispherically-combusted liters is no match for the newer, better R/T Scat Pack, which shows in full.

Both cars leave simultaneously this time, but the SRT8 trails behind its adversary for the entire 440-yard run. With a 13.87-second score (at 104 mph) versus the rival’s 12.50 at 110 mph, the old Challenger would have a hard time against a measly-in-guise Volkswagen Golf R, let alone a full-fledged muscle car.

Earlier in the day, the Demon made another pass in handicap mode, this time against the SRT8. It’s exactly as bad as you’d expect it to be, with the devil getting the whole thing done after 9.37 seconds at 144.7 mph. The poor SRT can’t ask for more from its life, with a 13.79 time and a 102.7 mph trap speed.