Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat Goes 9.40s without Nitrous

The record for the quickest quarter mile run for a Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat or Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat is currently held by the late John “TopCat” Toutkoushian and that record has stood for a couple of months now. When TopCat’s Hellcat Challenger set the record time of 9.46 at 145.5 miles per hour, he had a variety of modifications including a 150-shot of nitrous. Many of the quickest Hellcat Challengers and Chargers have turned in their top times with a bottle of laughing gas tucked in the trunk, but this past weekend, a nitrous-free Hellcat Challenger got within 2 hundredths of a second from matching TopCat’s record on the juice.

Brian Studey’s Hellcat Challenger
Brian Studey is the owner of the gorgeous Plum Crazy Hellcat Challenger shown above and the mod list for his Mopar muscle car includes a new upper and lower pulley (for more boost), larger fuel injectors, a 3.5” heat exchanger, Borla exhaust with a cat-less midpipe, 3.09 gears, and an E85 conversion from Tim Barth of Barth Tuning. Studey’s Hellcat also has lightweight front brake rotors, lightweight front wheels with skinny tires and lightweight rear tires with sticky Hoosier racing slicks.

The name Tim Barth should be familiar if you follow the world of Hellcat quarter mile records, as his shop Barth Tuning also tuned the record-holding Hellcat Charger, which ran a 9.581.

With a combination of those modifications, Tim Barth’s tuning efforts, good air and a great drive, Brian Studey was able to run a best time this past weekend of 9.48 at 145.13 miles per hour. That is just a heartbeat off of TopCat’s record of 9.46 at 145.50, and Studey did it without nitrous oxide – making his Plum Crazy Hellcat Challenger the quickest Hellcat car in the world without nitrous.

On this run, Studey pulled an awesome 1.423 60 foot time and before getting to the quarter mile stripe, his Hellcat Challenger laid down a 6.089 at 118.18 miles per hour in the 8th mile.

The reason that this record by Brian Studey and his Hellcat Challenger is so important is that those folks who want to downplay the performance of the Hellcat Dodge cars will use the fact that the record-setting cars have been running nitrous oxide as a knock against the car as a whole. Those folks talk as if nitrous is somehow cheating, but with Studey’s near-record run, he has proven that with more boost, more fuel, a good tune, sticky tires and a good driver – a Hellcat Challenger can run well into the deep 9-second range without nitrous.

Hellcat Records
So, in summary, Brian Studey now holds the no-nitrous record for the quickest Dodge Hellcat car of any kind of run the quarter mile with a time of 9.48, while the overall record for a Hellcat Dodge car was the 9.46 by TopCat with nitrous – both of which are fitted with the 8-speed automatic transmission. Finally, the quickest Hellcat Challenger with a manual transmission was the 9.79 from Bill Gamble and the quickest Hellcat Charger (with nitrous) was run by Steve Pryce with a 9.58.

With temperatures continuing to drop, we are bound to see some new Hellcat record times before trucks close up for the winter – and after that, we could see some big numbers from the folks racing in areas without a true winter.

In the meantime, crank up your speakers and enjoy the video of Brian Studey’s Hellcat Challenger running a 9.48 without nitrous!