Canidae Racing NHRA Las Vegas Advance

Toliver, NHRA Racers Have Short Turnaround after Houston

Jerry Toliver and his CANIDAE Racing Funny Car team have little time to lament the results of last weekend's NHRA Full Throttle Series race at Houston as they turn right around and prepare for this weekend's 10th annual SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on April 2-5. 

"I always look forward to our races at Las Vegas," Toliver said. "What's not to like? The Strip at Las Vegas is one of the best facilities on the circuit. And even though we're at the track most of the day, we're still in one of the greatest cities in the world. This is just a fun race weekend."

Toliver bumped into the field and qualified 15th at Houston on his final qualifying pass to give team owner/tuner Jim Dunn a unique birthday present on his 75th birthday. Toliver ran a weekend-best 4.198-second elapsed time at 288.52 mph in the CANIDAE/Lucas Oil Chevy to qualify for his fourth consecutive race to start the season with his new Jim Dunn Racing teammates. In Sunday eliminations Toliver fell to No. 2 qualifier Del Worsham despite running the fifth-quickest elapsed time in the first round. 

"It was great to get the CANIDAE car qualified for Big Jim on his birthday," Toliver said. "That was a nice present to give him. Now we need to keep working on getting consistent and going rounds on Sundays."

A two-hour telecast of qualifying coverage for the SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals can be seen on ESPN2 on Saturday, April 4, beginning at 8:00 p.m. (ET). Coverage on ESPN2 continues on Sunday, April 5, when NHRA Race Day will kick off eliminator coverage starting at 11:00 a.m. (ET), and concludes with three hours of final eliminations coverage beginning at 4:00 p.m. (ET).