The biggest challenge for the SRT Viper GTS-R this year was, of course, the 24 Hours of Le Mans->ke1591 race, where the two cars entering the race finished eighth and ninth. Those results weren't quite what SRT and Chrysler were expecting and they knew that the GTS-R needed more practice, so the team entered it in this weekend's Road America race where Dominik Farnbacher and Marc Goossens piloted the beast. We think this practice was a success, as it claimed first place in the GT Class.

From 1999 to 2000 the Viper ->ke4220 scored a total of 16 victories in the ALMS competition, with the last one being on December 31st, 2000 in Adelaide, Australia. This weekend's win is the 17th factory-backed victory for SRT Viper in the famed ALMS.

Goossens took the lead in the last 33 minutes of the race and held that position for the remainder of the race. He had to work pretty hard for the win though, the Viper was low on fuel in the final eight minutes of the race with the green flag flying. Fortunately, the race went into caution just before he hit the pits, causing the entire field to slow down. He skipped the pits, option to take advantage of the reduced speed to milk the last few drops of fuel from his tank.

The Viper not only took the GT Class, but it also totally dominated the entire weekend, as the No. 93 Pennzoil Ultra SRT Viper GTS-R claimed the pole, while the GT Class winner was fifth on the starting grid.

Click past the jump to read more about the SRT Viper GTS-R.

SRT Viper GTS-R

The GTS-R version of the new generation SRT Viper made its world debut along with the production version at the 2012 New York Auto Show. The model was developed in cooperation with Riley Technologies and it is almost identical to the base version, except of course its updates for track use.

Under the hood, the GTS-R keeps the usual 8.4-liter all-aluminum, V-10 overhead-valve engine that delivers a total of 640 horsepower and 600 pound-feet of torque. Thanks to this amazing output, Viper can sprint from 0 to 60 mph in low-3-second range and goes up to a top speed of 206 mph.