You realize that they put thin tires and various other handling mods on the Charger in that movie, so the stunt guys could hold it back against the Bullit Mustang? And even then they had problems running away from the Mustang :)
Back then, the Charger was the bomb-diggity :)
Right, sure.
The “actor” in the Movie driving the Charger was actually Bill Hickman, a famous Stunt Driver. He also had bit parts in other movies including The French Connection.
McQueen wanted to do all the driving in the Mustang, but the Director didn’t want to take a chance of the Star of his movie getting injured.
The Charger was “detuned” so it wouldn’t run away from the Mustang.