J.R. Todd, DHL Funny Car Runner-Up at Gainesville

Gainesville, FL – Todd and the DHL Toyota team had an excellent day reaching the final round of eliminations for the first time since Seattle last summer. Todd defeated Blake Alexander, Robert Hight and Chad Green before losing to Matt Hagan in the final. Todd was ahead for most of the final run, but the DHL Funny Car spun the tires causing the engine to backfire allowing Hagan to surge ahead and win the race.

When Todd advanced to the semifinals, he earned a spot in the Mission #2Fast2Tasty NHRA Challenge at the next race in Phoenix. During Saturday’s qualifying sessions in Phoenix, the drivers who reached the semifinals in Gainesville will re-run the semifinals and final earning additional purse and bonus points. Qualifying: J.R. Todd was the No. 6 qualifier at the NHRA season-opening Amalie Motor Oil Gatornationals. Todd needed just 3.900 seconds to reach the finish line at 329.99 mph in the weekend’s first round of qualifying Friday afternoon. In Saturday’s third and final qualifying session, the DHL Toyota Supra got too far inside and hit a timing block ending what appeared to be a stellar final qualifying attempt. Inclement weather caused cancelation of Friday’s second qualifying round.

Todd on Gainesville: “The DHL Toyota was running really well, and I thought it was our day. We had some misfortune in the last qualifying run hitting the cones that caused another late night and early morning for the DHL team; the guys were here really early this morning to get the car ready to race. It looked like things were kind of breaking in our favor with the problems Robert (John Force Racing driver Robert Hight) had in the second round, but we had our own issues with the first two runs not making it to the finish line fully under power.

“We got that straightened out in the semifinals, and I thought we were looking good in the final until it spun the tires and went ‘bang.’ That’s probably one of the bigger ones I’ve had. I’ve never had one that tried to launch the body off the car. We have a whole new combination this year. In years past, we could get away with it spinning the tires and not lifting but not this year – in the final round, if you don’t see the guy, you’re not gonna give up. We’ll put that one in the memory bank – we can’t do that.

“We definitely take a lot of positives from this weekend – last year, we only went to one final round in Seattle, and that was a season we’d like to forget. It’s refreshing – new car, new parts and pieces, and we ran really well in testing. We didn’t show our full potential this weekend, but we made some good qualifying runs, qualified sixth and went to the final round in the first race of the year. It would have been nice to get a win, but we got some good points and are locked into the Mission #2Fast2Tasty NHRA challenge which is cool and comes with some added bonus money which we really need now with all the body work we have to do.”