Dodge Viper SRT-10

“Beneath the brawny bodywork is a thunderous 600-hp, 8.4 L V-10 paired with a sturdy Tremec 6-speed manual. The SRT10 loves to be driven hard and blurs the line between a road car and a track car.” - Road & Track Magazine

It looks like a cartoonish caricature of a medieval spaceship, produces apocalyptic power, has massive rock-solid brakes, sports tires as wide as Rhode Island, is totally devoid of any electronic stability or traction control gadgetry…and does not even have a proper cup holder; and yet, there are few cars in the world, if any, that are as viscerally appealing when you light-up its colossal V-10 and shove your right foot toward the firewall. Straight sections of street are devoured in voracious gulps and belching exhaust. Scenery blurs and time slows as distances are warped long-to-short like an Einstein theory gone bad to the bone. At full fury, this 600 horsepower beast pummels the senses with titanic thrust and a cacophony of clamor that deafens occupants and onlookers alike. It is all-consuming, all-compelling and all-corrupting — it is a Dodge Viper.

Using the revered AC Cobra as a source of inspiration, the Dodge Viper was conceived as a modern interpretation of the classic American muscular car. It debuted as a concept car in 1989 at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit and went into (hand-built) production in early 1992.

Now in its fourth-generation, and brimming with numerous improvements to its engine and drivetrain, but still no proper cup holder, the Viper has remained the car that Dodge originally intended it to be – a no-nonsense, over-the-top supercar with incredible racecar-like capabilities powered by one of the world’s most potent production engines. Packing nearly twice the piston displacement of the Ferrari F430, the Viper’s 8.4L, 513 cubic inch, V-10 leviathan produces an astonishing 600 horsepower and a tire melting 560 lb-ft of torque.

The Viper is not for everyone, and when it rains, the Viper is not for anyone, but for those who like simple, primordial automotive pleasures – thunderous noise, unbridled power and the smell of scorched tires – the Viper has no equal.

Period.