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"We’ll have to up the pace a bit if the Viper’s true character is to shine through…
…and once we do, the street-rod veneer falls away and the sports car beneath is revealed. The steering wheel comes alive, the brakes are revealed to be steady and dependable, and the big power behind the grinning-snake badge becomes accessible. “Slow your hands down”, Michael Mills tells me, and he’s right – I’m trying to fight the Viper into submission. Relax, drive it like the world’s biggest, fastest Miata. Let the engine slide the tail in the tight sections, and the SRT-10 turns in magical fashion. The R8 is ahead of me, with Hardage at the wheel. He’s at the limit, the suspension squirming and the rear end dancing around a few inches at a time in tune with the rising and falling revs from the direct-injection V8. It’s a masterful performance, a real lesson in how the top drivers communicate with their cars, but from the driver’s seat of the Viper it’s slo-mo. I can drive by at any point I choose. Not just the straights, where the extra one hundred and eighty-six horsepower makes any drag race a farce, but in the corners as well. The Viper simply has more tire and far less understeer. Far less? More like none, thanks to the instant attitude adjustment available from the rumbling V-10. Around the sharp, slow “Diamond’s Edge”, the Viper sucks the Audi up effortlessly and I’m forced to short-shift to prevent an inadvertent bump-draft."
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Linear Mode
