Tina Boggess has been drag racing since the 1990s, so when she bought her Dodge Durango SRT® Hellcat, she figured that she would likely modify it a bit – perhaps add a smaller supercharger pulley for a bit more boost. Boggess has always been into performance vehicles and prior to her SRT Hellcat-powered SUV, she had owned six other Durangos, including the SRT 392 version that she still has today. She has always loved the Durango and as a mother of 14-year-old twins, she needs the space. Thanks to Dodge, getting that space doesn’t require any sort of compromise in performance, with the SRT Hellcat being the world’s quickest, fastest and most powerful three-row SUV.
However, Tina Boggess’ Durango isn’t just one of the quickest three-row SUVs in the world; it is THE quickest SRT Hellcat model in the world, having run a best time of 9.09 at 150.20 in the quarter-mile.
You read that right. The Dodge Durango SRT Hellcat shown here, which looks like an SUV that you would see sitting next to you in rush hour traffic, is nearly running in the 8-second range. Best of all, Boggess still uses this Durango to go grocery shopping, take her kids to school and perform other daily tasks – and she plans for it to keep on being a mom car when it runs in the 8s.
As for Tina herself, regular DodgeGarage readers may recognize her name, as we previously talked about a popular automotive themed podcast that she cohosts. The T-N-T Podcast looks at a wide variety of issues, but with both hosts being hardcore muscle car women, racing and performance cars are a popular topics.
A History of Dodge Muscle
Tina Boggess explains that she has always been someone who drives and races performance vehicles. Early in her racing days, she spent time at the track in a 1994 Dodge Dakota and a 1967 Plymouth Barracuda which was powered by a 426 HEMI® engine and ran in the low-6-second range in the 8th mile. In more recent years, Boggess has owned some SRT Hellcat cars that also made some runs down the track, but none of them were as heavily modified as her SRT Hellcat Durango.
In addition to those vehicles mentioned above from track time, Boggess has owned a total of eight Durangos and she still has two, with one being her SRT 392 that has more than 130,000 miles on the odometer. She also has a 2021 Ram 2500 with the Cummins Turbo Diesel engine, so today, she spends all of her driving time behind the wheel of something with a whole lot of torque. She points out that the Durango SRT 392 is really her true daily driver, but the SRT Hellcat is still driven at least once a week.
The Record-Setting Durango
If you were to walk past Tina Boggess’ Dodge Durango SRT Hellcat in the parking lot of your local movie theater, you might not think anything of it, shy of the fact that it is an SRT Hellcat model. She has some racing-related decals on the rear windows, but even the wheels that she uses at the track don’t look all that different from a wheel that many Durango owners use for daily driving. However, if you were to line up with her at the track and you don’t run in the deep 9s, she would leave you in the dust.
Under the hood of this Durango SRT Hellcat is a 6.2-liter engine that was built by Demon Performance and TKM, featuring stronger connecting rods and pistons, ported cylinder heads from ThiTek, a factory supercharger with a smaller-than-stock pulley and both a Hellephant Killer Snout and Xtreme Billet Bearing Plate from SDG Motorsports, a Fore Innovations fuel system, a Nitrous Outlet system, Kooks headers, an MMX camshaft, a Legmaker cold air intake and a proper tune from Brent Hughes of DPT Racing to make the best use of VP Racing Fuels X98.
Helping send all of that HEMI engine power to the wheels is a Sipple Speed and Performance-built transfer case, factory differentials with a Per4Mance Development brace out back and G Force Axles, while a set of Mickey Thompson street radials puts the power to the ground. The total vehicle build was handled by Scott Boegler of American Muscle Performance in Florida.
As mentioned above, the best elapsed time for Boggess’ Durango was a 9.09 at 150.2 with the nitrous oxide, but even without it, this three-row SUV has run a 9.52 at 143.14.
Boggess plans to continue to work toward the 8-second range, but she only wants to get into the 8s to set the bar. After that, she wants to go back to running regularly in the 9s, because she does not want to put a safety cage in the Durango. This SUV is still a “Mom Car” first, so she won’t add a bunch of metal bars running through the rear of the cabin. That wouldn’t be safe for her kids, who rely on this vehicle to get around, but who also serve as her pit crew at the track. Racing the Durango SRT Hellcat is a family affair, so Boggess is making sure that the vehicle is safe and comfortable for everyone.
Tina Boggess’ goal for the 2023 season is to continue racing her Dodge Durango SRT Hellcat with her kids by her side, but looking to the future, she wants to get them both into the driver’s seat and let them experience the wonders of drag racing. When that day comes, Boggess explains that she will become their pit crew, and having grown up racing with my dad as my pit crew, I know what an awesome and rewarding experience that can be for the parents and the kids.
In the meantime, Boggess also takes the world’s fastest Durango SRT Hellcat to car shows. When she isn’t doing record-setting SRT Hellcat things, she attends the hill climb events that her son, Chase, competes in with his dirt bike and archery matches of her daughter, Zoey, whose team won a West Virginia State Championship in 2022. Finally, as mentioned above, she continues to host the popular podcast with Tara Graves, an SRT Hellcat Challenger owner and racer.
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