Westen Champlin is a Roadkill Nights Powered by Dodge Grudge Match veteran and for 2024, he is the only competitor who is campaigning a classic Mopar® muscle car. To be more specific, Westen will battle the field in a 1970 Plymouth Road Runner that has spent the majority of its life as a racecar. This is also the only non-Dodge in the Grudge Match field, but the rules do allow for either Dodge or Plymouth vehicles.
The only other rule for the 2024 Roadkill Nights Grudge Match is that the teams use a new twin turbocharger, 3.0-liter Hurricane inline-six engine – the engine for the upcoming Dodge Charger Six Pack. With that in mind, Westen’s 1970 Plymouth is obviously powered by the new Hurricane engine, mated to an 8-speed automatic transmission. The engine is fed by an Aeromotive fuel system and an Optima battery provides the power for this old-school drag car with modern power.
This 1970 Plymouth Road Runner was built by the team at Wesley Motorsports and is running a suspension setup that was described to me as being built along the guidelines of the old Mopar Performance suspension catalog. It has super stock springs out back with a pinion snubber and 90/10 shocks. It does have modern Wilwood 4-piston brakes up front, but it maintains the classic drums in the rear. Power is sent to the ground by means of a set of 28×9 Mickey Thompson drag slicks.
On the inside, this Road Runner is all business, having been gutted to remove weight and to make room for the roll bar.
In just about every way, Westen Champlin’s 1970 Plymouth Road Runner looks like a car that you would have seen at your local drag strip on a Tuesday night. The only exception is the twin turbocharger Hurricane I6 engine under the hood.
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