Team CANIDAE Reaches Out to Race Fans Everywhere Over the Weekend

This past weekend, Team CANIDAE Racing struck out across North America, from Mexico to Florida to New Orleans to Texas and Arizona, supporting Independent Retailers and sharing the message of Responsible Pet Ownership to hundreds of thousands of race fans and pet owners on behalf of CANIDAE All Natural Pet Foods.

It was a big week for Team CANIDAE with a total of six different events taking place. First up, Branden Jesseman continues to gather steam on the CANIDAE Motosport Kawasaki Supercross team. After winning his qualifying heat, Branden finished on the podium Saturday with a strong second place in New Orleans at the Live Nation SuperCross East-5 race. This was Jesseman's best race of the season and he is in top form heading into St. Louis next weekend.  Read the full story

Jerry Toliver and Jim Dunn Racing turned in their best performance yet in the still-young 2009 NHRA Full Throttle Series season. Toliver has only had 10 total passes in the CANIDAE Monte Carlo so far and keeps improving. At last weekend's 40th annual ACDelco NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway in Florida, Toliver edged out Force Racing's Mike Neff in the first round. Toliver lost traction in the second round and was bested by veteran John Force. Read the full story

Managed by Ed Torrance, the CANIDAE Kawasaki Team Green amateur riders made their mark on the second amateur national of the new season by dominating the week in Texas, with an astonishing total of 1st, 2nd and 3rd place finishes to their name. The Team Green riders are one step closer to racing at the Amateur National Motocross Championships at Loretta Lynn’s. Full information coming to the CANIDAE Racing blog soon.

The 23rd Tecate SCORE San Felipe 250 race saw 226 total starters with only 162 finishers. This grueling 232.4 mile race in San Felipe, Baja California, Mexico concluded Saturday. In the Class 10 division, Scott Gailey and Scott Whipple shared driving duty and powered the CANIDAE Class 10 machine to a third place finish with a time of 6:20:30. Congratulations guys!

In sand drag news, the 2009 NSDA series completed its second race of the season in Yuma, Arizona with some awesome racing on eliminations day. After racing the same day and finishing 3rd at the San Felipe 250 in Mexico on Saturday, driver Scott Whipple and crew member Carl Boley raced back to Yuma making it just in time for the final qualifying session of top fuel.  Whipple and crew ripped off an amazing 2.382 on their only qualifying pass good for the #3 spot on the ladder. Whipple, with only one pass under his belt, went on to be narrowly defeated by only 6/100th's of a second by Matt Ludlow, who ran his career best pass of 2.34 and low ET for the event, in eliminations on Sunday. Shane Switzer went on to grab his first top fuel win. Congratulations to Shane, Mike and his entire crew for a great win. Whipple and the 2008 championship CANIDAE Top Fuel Team currently sit in 3rd place in their quest for another season championship just 12 points off the leader. Whipple was pleased with the team's efforts, and to be the first and only person to race in the Baja 250 and a Sand Drag event in the same day!

In the Top Alcohol bracket, our hats are off to Nick Januik who won his first NSDA T/A championship from our own 2008 T/A season champion Mike DeNunzio when Mike couldn't make it to the line in time after suffering engine damage in his semi final heat win. Take good care of that Nick. Mike wants it back soon!

Stay tuned to www.canidaeracing.com and canidaeracing.blogspot.com for more racing updates. Great job Team CANIDAE!

Canidae Racing Team Turns in Best Performance of Young Season

Jerry Toliver and his Jim Dunn Racing team turned in its best performance of the young drag racing season at this weekend's 40th annual ACDelco NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway, the third of 24 races on the NHRA Full Throttle Series season. Toliver entered today's eliminations qualified 12th after four consistent rounds of qualifying and then drove his Canidae/Lucas Oil Chevy Funny Car past Force Racing's Mike Neff in the first round. Toliver had a winning elapsed time of 4.240 seconds at 257.24 mph to Neff's 4.428 e.t. at 269.13 mph.

Toliver wasn't as fortunate in the second round as 14-time Funny Car champ John Force bested him with an elapsed time of 4.178 seconds at 300.73 as Toliver lost traction at half-track and slowed to a 5.582 e.t. at 134.26 mph.

"I'm extremely happy with the team this weekend," Toliver said. "Going rounds is difficult, and I don't care who you are, it's hard to go rounds. For this team to be able to go rounds in such a short amount of time is impressive. That was only our 10th lap on the car, I think, so this Canidae car has potential. Just a couple of more laps and I think Jim (owner/crew chief Dunn) is going to have it dialed in there and we'll be competitive. It's just a matter of putting all of the pieces together and we're very close."

Next stop on the 24-race NHRA Full Throttle Drag Series is the O'Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals at Houston Raceway Park in Baytown, Texas, from March 27-29.

Kirk Weeks

Canidae Racing Team Making Early-Season Strides as NHRA Full Throttle Series Heads to Gainesville

The 2009 NHRA Full Throttle season is only two races old, but Funny Car driver Jerry Toliver likes the direction the Jim Dunn Racing team is going with his Canidae/Lucas Oil Chevy Funny Car as they prepare for this weekend's 40th annual ACDelco NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway.  He has qualified for both the rain-shortened season opener at Pomona (Calif.) and at Phoenix where a solid 4.122-second, 302.08 mph lap placed him 10th on the grid for Sunday's eliminations at Firebird Raceway.

  

"We're pretty happy with the progress we're making here early in the season," Toliver said.  "We're just taking small steps at a time as we try and get better.  You have to keep in mind, this is a brand-new car and this team has a brand-new driver, so we're going to get better with each lap we make.

"You could see that in Phoenix when Jim (team owner/crew chief Dunn) hit the tune-up in qualifying and we ran a 4.12 at 302.  That just shows you how well versed he is in tuning these Funny Cars.  Even though we lost first round, we are a lot closer than it might look.  We could be a lot farther off the mark, but we're definitely in the window and have something to work with."

The veteran Toliver scored his second win of the season here at Gainesville in 2000 when he defeated Dean Skuza, Tony Pedregon and Todd Paton before besting Ron Capps in a final-round battle of Camaros for career win No. 3.

I love going to the Gatornationals," Toliver said.  "I mean, it's one of the two or three really big, historic races we have on our schedule, along with maybe Pomona and Indy.  The weather's always nice, there's just a huge turnout the entire weekend and the fans are great.  

"I was fortunate enough to win here in 2000 when I beat Ron Capps in the final round.  In fact, I've been fortunate enough to win at Pomona and Gainesville both, so that's two of maybe the three biggest races we have.  It would be great to add Gainesville to the resume a second time this weekend.  We're looking forward to it."

A two-hour telecast of qualifying coverage for the ACDelco NHRA Gatornationals can be seen on ESPN2 on Sunday, March 15, beginning at 2:00 a.m. (ET).  Coverage on ESPN2 continues on Sunday, March 15, when NHRA Race Day will kick off eliminator coverage starting at 11:30 a.m. (ET), and concludes with three hours of final eliminations coverage beginning at 3:00 p.m. (ET).

Kirk Weeks