The Dodge Durango Hellcat is one of the most interesting SUVs ever made. Not only is it fast, but it also sounds amazing thanks to the 710 horsepower V8 it stole from a muscle car. But can it beat the Lamborghini or SUVs?
The Hellcat-swapped Durango is literally a muscle car with three rows of seats, the hot rod for going on family trips. However, you almost never see it doing drag races. A couple of days ago, I talked to Andrei about this and we speculated that it’s rare, so maybe too many of them are in the hands of collectors, still protected by plastic wrappers.
Canadian YouTuber has made a great contribution to the Durango Hellcat drag racing genre by putting a purple Dodge against what many people think is a “fast SUV.” Pointy nose, yellow paint and a supercar name: we’re talking about the Lamborghini Urus, of course.
If you’ve watched these two drag racing before, you’ll know the Durango Hellcat doesn’t stand a chance. The powertrain in the Urus is just better hooked up for launching. However, the specs of these vehicles favor the American model.
The all-American V8 is a 6.2-liter that’s been supercharged to produce 710 horsepower. Along with the Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk and the Ram 1500 TRX, the Durango is one of three to also boast standard AWD, so the power is better put down than in the 797 horsepower Challenger Redeye.
The Durango Hellcat is officially rated at 0 to 60 mph in 3.5 seconds and has a top speed of 180 miles per hour. There are obviously many other fast SUVs. A Tesla Model X Plaid will probably eat this alive, but the Dodge is a smile-inducing experience and can keep up with expensive-sounding names, like Bentley, Jaguar, Porsche, BMW, or Maserati.
Meanwhile, its rival, the Lamborghini Urus, packs a smaller 4.0-liter V8, which is twin-turbocharged. The powertrain is similar to what Audi, Porsche, and even Bentley use. However, the Urus currently has the highest output at 641 horsepower.
World’s quickest SUVs?
As Sam mentions, the 0 to 60 time of the Lambo is better, and that’s perfectly reflected in the drag race. The yellow Urus pulls ahead immediately and stretches its lead right to the end of the race.
So is it just that the launch control is bad? Not really. The two rolling races that follow also show the Urus pulling ahead. You can see its 8-speed ZF gearbox swapping gears way faster, but the power gap between the two V8s is probably non-existent.
But if you do a search of fast SUVs right now, something pretty funny will turn up. Both the Kia EV6 and the Ford Mustang Mach-E have versions with 480 horsepower and they can do 0 to 60 mph in 3.5 seconds. So technically, they’re among the quickest (not fastest), even though they’re not SUVs in the traditional sense.
What’s the most powerful SUV in the world? Technically, this title still belongs to the Durango Hellcat. Aston Martin came pretty close with its new DBX707, making 697 hp. Also, the Brabus models with 888 hp (900 Rocket) are taken into consideration by some charts because they’ve got their own VIN.
