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The term ‘race car for the street’ is one that’s thrown around liberally by ad agencies and auto writers alike, and it’s been pinned on any number of track-oriented automobiles that leave the factory with more than their fair share of big brake packages, roll cages, or trunk spoiler square footage. The 2016 Dodge Viper ACR, however, is something different. You see, when you walk away with 13 track records at some of the most celebrated road courses in America – including Laguna Seca and Virginia International Raceway – people tend to take notice. When you accomplish that feat without the benefit of all-wheel drive, a fancy dual-clutch gearbox, or a million-dollar hybrid system, well, then you’ve got the entire world’s attention.
At its core, the Viper ACR doesn’t stray too far from its roots as Dodge’s most athletic sports car. Peel back the ACR’s extroverted body work and you’ll find the same platform, six-speed manual transmission, and 8.4-liter V10 engine as the ‘base’ model, with the latter good for 645 horsepower and 600 lb-ft of torque. What sets the king snake apart from its lesser Viper siblings is the extreme level of good old-fashioned analog adjustability that it offers drivers and their respective pit crews.
It all starts with the Dodge’s aero package – or should I say the ‘Extreme Aero Package,’ which adds a panoply of wings, spoilers, dive planes, and cut-outs to the car. That giant picnic table bench perched on the rear deck? Fully customizable. That spoiler tacked underneath the ACR’s chin? You can remove it if it’s cramping your style, and it’s made of a material designed to wear down and be inexpensive to replace should curbing or elevation changes take their toll. The same is true of the rear diffuser, while the Viper ACR’s clamshell hood houses removable panels above each wheel as well as at its center in order to expel hot air from the engine bay and reduce lift. In total, you’re looking at almost a full ton of downforce from a properly-configured ACR when traveling at its top speed of 283 km/h.
This spirit of personalization applies to the Dodge Viper ACR’s suspension system, which includes adjustable remote-reservoir Bilstein dampers, springs featuring more than double the rate of the stock car, and thicker sway bars. In short, the ACR is begging for an individualized setup at each and every one of the tracks you take it to. Think of it as a bespoke weapon awaiting deployment, and you’ve got the general idea.
That being said, don’t make the mistake of thinking that the Dodge’s intimidating specs and lack of electronic nannies running interference transform it into some kind of high speed bludgeon. Far from it. Banish the memory of Vipers gone by that occasionally had drivers feeling like they were strapped to the back of a twitchy cruise missile that was disdainful of any accidental misstep. As long as you’ve got the pit lane engineering degree to understand how to put everything together so that it helps, and doesn’t hinder your progress on the track, you’ll be amazed by the pliability of Dodge’s super car.
At least I was. After pulling out onto the front straight at Chuckwalla Valley Raceway in California, I was immediately struck by just how effortlessly the Viper ACR translated my right foot requests into forward momentum, with nary a tail-shake regardless of how early I got on the throttle upon exiting a corner. Lap after lap in the properly set-up car (thanks to SRT’s support team) had me pushing the boundaries of braking that much closer to the turn-in point, relying on the carbon ceramic stoppers to hold up their end of the bargain, until in some parts of the track I simply neglected to hit the center pedal at all and relied on the phenomenal mechanical and aero grip provided by the ACR to keep me firmly ratcheted to the tarmac.
The 2016 Dodge Viper ACR turned in a virtuosic performance in my own decidedly intermediate hands, and while that’s to be expected from today crop of binary-driven supercars, in the ACR it’s an even more amazing accomplishment. It’s really just you, the car, and the road beneath your wheels out there when you put the hammer down on the Dodge’s enormous V-10, with no adaptive suspension, active traction management, or center differential on-hand to gloss over your mistakes and mitigate the car’s ability to do any serious damage. Yes, there’s a stability control system that comes standard with the Dodge, but with so much stickiness on hand from the coupe’s enormous 19-inch tires it’s unobtrusive to the point of being absent.
If you’re looking for a high performance appliance that will do half the work for you when setting FTD at your local time trial, then you’ll have to turn your attention elsewhere. If you’re interested in mastering a human-machine interface that banishes ones and zeros in favour of pure visceral engineering aptitude, then Dodge welcomes you with arms wide open. The Viper ACR is a car that requires you to be fully present, and the reward it provides for being there together in the moment is ample.
