Wilkerson is hoping for a change in Las Vegas luck

LAS VEGAS, Prerace: The upcoming stop on the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series tour is the ACDelco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals which is being held at one of the premier facilities, The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. In the past, The Strip hasn't been very lucky for Tim Wilkerson and his Levi, Ray & Shoup Chevrolet Impala SS Funny Car, coming up with DNQs the last few visits. But with the performance Wilkerson and his beautiful hot rod have been enjoying of late, the talented driver and tuner is hoping his luck in Las Vegas is in for a change.

"We've had such trouble at Vegas the last couple of years," expressed Wilkerson, "that I don't even want to brag about that place. The place hates me with a passion. I didn't qualify the last three times. But this year we're going to go there with our chins up and hopefully we can make her run the way she's suppose to there. I think we can do some good if we get to Sunday. We'll just have to see how it goes."

Wilkerson has enjoyed two No. 1 qualifying efforts this year, the latest in Dallas a few weeks ago, where he also posted the fastest Funny Car speed of the meet and his talented team earned the top honor given to a crew, the Full Throttle Pit Crew Challenge. And then at the next race in Richmond, Wilkerson advanced to the semifinal round, taking out several top dogs along the way.

Coming off back-to-back strong weekends is a tremendous boost to this hard working team. Wilkerson and his crew have known all along that they could be contenders, but it just took longer than they would have liked to get the car performing at the level they needed. Although, they aren't in the championship hunt, with a little Las Vegas luck thrown into the mix, you never know where Wilkerson and his team will take the Levi, Ray & Shoup Funny Car.