Toliver Looking Forward to NHRA's Return to Charlotte

After the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series' auspicious debut in Charlotte with its inaugural race last year in Charlotte, CANIDAE Racing Funny Car driver Jerry Toliver is like a lot of his peers and looks forward to the series' return this weekend for the Second annual NHRA Carolinas Nationals at zMAX Dragway. Track owner Bruton Smith's latest addition to NHRA's quarter-mile lineup (he also owns The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Bristol (Tenn.) Dragway, and Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif.) is a state-of-the-art facility that drew huge crowds to this premiere drag race in the heart of NASCAR country.

"Bruton Smith seems to raise the bar every time he builds a new race facility," Toliver said. "All of his tracks are just gems on the circuit and the new dragstrip in Charlotte is certainly no exception. What a great facility and the number of fans that came out to last year's race was unbelievable. It was a great event and it's easy to understand why they are going to race there twice next year. We're certainly looking forward to putting on another great show for the Charlotte fans."

In the last two races Toliver has had a quarterfinal finish at Reading (Pa.) and a season-best qualifying effort at the U.S. Nationals at Indy, so the Jim Dunn Racing pilot looks to continue that performance trend when he first lines up the CANIDAE/Lucas Oil/WileyX Chevy on the zMAX Dragway starting line starting with first-round qualifying on Friday.

"We ran the third-quickest e.t. in our final qualifying session at Indy, so now we need to work on backing those kind of performance numbers up," Toliver said. "The good thing is this CANIDAE car is responding to what Jim (team owner/crew chief) is asking it to do. That hasn't always been the case this year. We've got a good hot rod here, so I'm fired up going back to Charlotte."

A two-hour telecast of qualifying coverage for the NHRA Carolinas Nationals can be seen on ESPN2 and ESPN2 HD on Saturday, Sept. 19, beginning at 11:30 p.m. (ET). Coverage on ESPN2 and ESPN2 HD continues on Sunday, Sept. 20, when NHRA Race Day kicks off eliminator coverage starting at 11:00 am (ET), and concludes with three hours of final-eliminations coverage beginning at 7:00 p.m. (ET).

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