Dodge is on a mission to prove there is life after the V8. If muscle car traditionalists are still clutching their rosaries over the demise of the legendary Hemi, Dodge’s latest stunt at Laguna Seca might just blow their hats off.
From September 18 to 20, the iconic California circuit hosts the GRIDLIFE Laguna Seca Festival, and Dodge is bringing two heavily mutated Chargers built specifically to rip sideways through the Corkscrew.
At the heart of these builds is the new 3.0-liter Hurricane twin-turbo inline-six engine. In stock trim, the Charger Scat Pack pushes out a respectable 550 HP via an all-wheel-drive system and an automatic gearbox. Fun for die-hard drifters? Hardly.
To fix that, Dodge teamed up with Mike Musto from Hemmings and builder Suppy Wejpanich of Suppy’s Garage to perform surgery on sanity itself. They threw out the front driveshafts, binned the automatic transmission, cranked the twin-turbo six up to 750 HP, a massive 200-hp jump, and crammed in a custom manual transmission. The ghost of muscle past just fainted.
The two drift builds serve distinct roles. The two-door Charger BOOST Coupe is a lean, mean performance weapon built for raw drifting precision. Meanwhile, the four-door Charger RPM, hilariously short for “Rapid People Mover”, is tailored to carry brave passengers along for the smoky ride, proving that sheer terror is best shared with friends.
Professional drivers Corey Hosford and Micah Diaz will be behind the wheel, showing spectators what happens when you liberate a modern muscle car from its street-legal handcuffs.
While these tire-slaying monsters previously teased fans at Roadkill Nights, GRIDLIFE marks their full-track debut in California. And for attendees who prefer not to leave with severe neck whiplash, Dodge is also offering “Thrill Rides” in standard 550-hp Scat Packs.
Ultimately, whether you mourn eight cylinders or celebrate the twin-turbo revolution, watching a 750-hp manual SIXPACK obliterate rubber proves one thing: Dodge haven’t lost their unhinged personality.
