Do you really need a daily driver with a top speed of a NASCAR machine? Considering this month's exclusive test of the Hennessey Venom 650R, a frighteningly powerful Dodge Viper GTS clocked at 214.7 mph, that's a shockingly real question.
Grasp this: Hennessey's latest concoction is a certified smog-legal commuter with quicker 0-60 mph acceleration than an Indy car! (Check Mac DeMere's instrumented test of the Motor Trend-sponsored Cobb Racing/Roberto Guerrero IRL car in this issue if you don't believe me.)
Okay, so it's incredibly quick. But why would any sane human pay the $160,000 price of entry to buy one?
For many, the automotive drug of Hortospe (horsepower/torque/speed) is as addictive as any designer meth-amphetamine cooked up in a Simi Valley trash can. And, the desire to consume ever more potent dosages rises exponentially. Check your memory banks on this one. Think back to what "Fast" meant to you as a kid. And, I'm talking first-hand-experience top speed "fast", not adolescent dreams of that 427 Vette or Ram Air GTO you never even got close to. I vividly remember the first time I ever drove 120 mph. I was 16, and wrapped the needle on my '69 Pontiac Grand Prix's speedometer all the way around to the big end, with 20 mph more left to go on the dial. Scary stuff on bias-belt tires with the cords showing, I can assure you. To me, that was way fast. Especially compared to the econoboxes most folks drove back then, in 1974.
In the mid-'80s, as cars got fast again, so did our experiences with speed. My first 150-mph drive was in a new '85 Corvette, out in the middle of the California desert. I can absolutely recall the thrill of watching the digital numbers on the speedo change from 149 to 150. Just a few weeks later, in an '85 Porsche Carrera Cabriolet, I did the feat again, but this time it was somehow less exciting. (A year later, I was behind the wheel of the Porsche 959, hitting 190-plus mph on a German autobahn, but I don't really count the feats of that car in this regard because the 959 was never allowed to be highway certified in America.) By 1990, the buttoned-down corporate-approved Lexus LS400 luxury sedan was capable of reaching 150 mph, so where was the thrill of that velocity anymore? Ho-hum.
In the '90s, the escalation of performance levels was increasing at record pace. By the start of the decade, I'd already surpassed 170 mph in various US-spec Porsches and Ferraris, and it was the Corvette ZR-1 that first took me to 180 mph in a street car. By comparison, the new go-fast kids like the Acura NSX, Mazda RX-7, Mitsubishi 3000GT VR4, and Nissan 300ZX Turbo were just...um, adequate.
Then came Viper.
Although the first '92 R/T10 roadster was not such an impressive top-speed machine (at 160 mph in the open car, with its scarily darty steering and Level 5 hurricane cockpit turbulence, you wanted to go no faster) the later GTS Coupe was just stellar at super-legal velocities. In last year's Viva Velocity test (5/98) of ultra-performance cars, the Viper GTS blew 'em all away with its 192-mph top-speed blast.
For some people living on the lunatic fringe of automotive sanity (that's us!) there's the need for even more speed. Obviously, we aren't alone, because Hennessey Motorsports has been busy modifying Vipers for the past seven years. Our previous test of the Houston-based company's then-hottest 602 horsepower asp-kicker (12/97) was a 203-mph romp to insanity. Think that'd be enough? Oh no.
John Hennessey's 650-horsepower Venom 650R is here.
The "speed kills"-spewing automotive-Luddites among our society love to wrap their tentacles around a news item like a 215-mph street machine. But, Hennessey's being responsible. Every purchaser of a Venom-modified Viper receives free high-performance training at Justin Bell's driving school. Just like another speed-crazed Texan provided for new owners of his Cobra more than three decades ago.
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