The muscle car fans out there may recall that after Dodge released its utterly insane drag-racing, wheel-standing Challenger Demon unto the world, the team at Texas-based Hennessey Performance fired back with a creation of its own – a tuned Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 with one-tonne of power dubbed The Exorcist that was designed solely to kill the Demon. Get it?

Well now, pre-emptively to anyone else coming along with a muscle car more powerful than The Exorcist, Hennessey has gone and outdone itself with its latest creation – the Resurrection, which has been revealed in Las Vegas at this week’s SEMA Show and is being dubbed by its maker as “the first hyper-muscle car.”

Starting off in life as a Camaro ZL1 1LE, the most hardcore Camaro variant GM offers, its original 485kW LT4 is removed and replaced with the LT5 engine from the outgoing C7 Corvette ZR1.

While this swap on its own would give it an already meatier 563kW, the entire engine is completely taken to pieces and almost all components are upgraded before it goes in, from the now-ported supercharger to a different camshaft at the bottom. As a result, this LT5 runs on E85 fuel and makes an insane 895kW (1200bhp) and 1356Nm. For once, describing a power figure as insane isn’t just mere hyperbole.

Hennessey will give customers the choice of GM’s 10-speed automatic with upgraded clutch packs and a new torque converter, or for those who are really game, a six-speed manual with a heavy duty Centerforce clutch.

According to Hennessey’s claims, it should be able to achieve a top speed in excess of 354km/h (220mph) and complete the standing quarter in 9.3 seconds at 241km/h. A 0-100km/h time of 2.3 seconds is also cited, although having driven a regular Camaro ZL1 and knowing how much of a handful that is to get off the line, I feel a lack of traction makes that figure perhaps a little too optimistic for the average driver.

Making it sound a lot easier than we’re sure it actually was to create, company founder and CEO John Hennessey notes that, “We’ve built several 1,200 horsepower C7 ZR1 Corvettes, so we knew we could deliver this same power level in the ZL1 1LE, but we just needed a cool name to fit the car. The Resurrection seemed to be the perfect evolution of The Exorcist, which was a name that was ultimately inspired by the Dodge Demon.”

In the US, the Hennessey Resurrection will be available through normal Chevrolet dealers for a whopping US$200,000 (A$289,800) with just 24 set to be produced.

Although it’s unlikely that you’ll ever see a right-hand drive one here in Australia, there could always be a chance – Adelaide-based KPM Motorsport, the only official Hennessey workshop outside the US, has made the only right-hook version of The Exorcist in the world, so hey, there could always be a chance.

Patrick Jackson
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