F-450 Super Duty

Make
Ford
Segment
Sports Car

Ken Block, the Head Hoonigan In Charge of entertaining us with smoky, daring, perfectly coordinated driving escapades, is arguably one of the most recognizable and crazy drivers on the planet. For years now, he's entertained with his Gymkhana series of drifting videos, but now after 10 of them, he's handed the keys to the kingdom to another motoring lunatic, Travis Pastrana.

Gymkhana 11 will feature Pastrana, who is best known for his insane motorcycle stunts. So is Mr. Block retiring? No. Ford Performance has unveiled a concept for Block's next toy, and it's something pleasingly old-school. In addition, a new video has just been released by Hoonigan, and his tire-shredding machine of choice for this exhibition is a massive 8,000-pound Ford F-450 dually.

The video starts with a quick look around Hoonigan Racing Development headquarters, before we find Block and his colleague Zac Mertens on a massive patch of empty concrete at the Utah Motorsport Campus. The F-450 is there, but not alone. On a trailer behind it is Blocks Mk2 Escort. The idea is that Zac will do a burnout on the trailer while Ken drives the dually. However, before the wheels on the Escort have any chance of slipping, Zac decimates the driveshafts. With no spares, the little Escort is out of action. Still, that doesn't stop someone like Ken Block from having a good time.

For the next five minutes or so, the dually does burnouts and drifts around the Escort and the whole track. If this sounds easy, it's not. Block explains that letting off the gas pedal to shift the weight of the F-450 almost completely stops the truck as he waits for boost to build again. Eventually, he figures out that third gear is the right ratio that keeps the wheel speed up.

While we now know how to get an 8,000-pound dually sideways, we wouldn't recommend trying this at home and we imagine it may affect your warranty. Or maybe not. Who's gonna believe that you drifted an F-450 on concrete?

Block may be stepping away from Gymkhana, but he still seems to love what he does. Will we see another Climbkhana? Here's hoping.