David Buckner is ready to take on all comers in the American Drag Racing League Tour’s newest class, the SuperCar Showdown, and he let it be known when he became the first racer to commit to the full season. Buckner, a second generation drag racer from New Waverly, Tex., will pilot his naturally-aspirated 6.1-liter Evolution Custom Auto Dodge Challenger DragPak against today’s fastest production cars when the 2012 ADRL season kicks off at the CarSafe Dragpalooza VIII at Royal Purple Raceway in Houston on March 30-31.

Image credit: ADRL.us

“The Evolution team is totally committed to this new class,” said Buckner who recently tested out the new car.  The vehicle Buckner will do battle with against some of the quickest and fastest production cars around has already earned a reputation as one of the best performing V8-powered Dodge’s ever. “We were so excited when the news was released about the SuperCar Showdown that our sponsor, Marty Robertson, immediately made the decision to follow the entire tour. We’ve wanted an opportunity to run in a true heads-up class for so long and, now that we have it, we’re absolutely thrilled.” Robertson, the owner of Evolution Custom Auto Restoration and Performance Center in Arlington, Tex., will also debut a second Dodge Challenger during the season and will field a Chevrolet Cavalier in the extremely popular Extreme 10.5 class, making Team Evolution one of the biggest teams in the ADRL.

Buckner, who comes from a racing family – his father Ray and brother Jason are both big drag racers – is focused and ready for the challenge of the new class. “Our focus right now is to prepare the DragPak Challenger for the ADRL series. We feel the minimum weight restrictions in the SuperCar Showdown series are just about perfect to make almost any car competitive. Between the supercharged cars, the V-10 Dodges and the naturally-aspirated V8s, it’s going to be a battle. We know our car can run with the best but Marty Robertson and the Evolution Custom Auto team have very high expectations for us. Marty wants to win this thing. I’m just so happy to be a part of the first real no-holds-barred program for these cars that I can’t wait for the first race at Baytown. I’m not kidding; I am really excited about this program.”