Chev Chelios, a hit man wanting to go straight, lets his latest target slip away. Then he awakes the next morning to a phone call that informs him he has been poisoned and has only an hour to live unless he keeps adrenaline coursing through his body while he searches for an antidote.

Terminal Island, New York: 2020. Overcrowding in the US penal system has reached a breaking point. Prisons have been turned over to a monolithic Weyland Corporation, which sees jails full of thugs as an opportunity for televised sport. Adrenalized inmates, a global audience hungry for violence and a spectacular, enclosed arena come together to form the 'Death Race', the biggest, most brutal event.

Barney Ross leads a band of highly skilled mercenaries including knife enthusiast Lee Christmas, a martial arts expert Yin Yang, heavy weapons specialist Hale Caesar, demolitionist Toll Road, and a loose-cannon sniper Gunner Jensen. When the group is commissioned by the mysterious Mr. Church to assassinate the dictator of a small South American island, Barney and Lee visit the remote locale to scout out their opposition and discover the true nature of the conflict engulfing the city.