This weekend’s PDRA Thunder Valley Throwdown presented by Larry Jeffers Race Cars is set to host perhaps the largest Pro Boost field of the season, thanks in part to the addition of new faces like Carson Perry, who’s making his debut in the class. Racing as a teammate to the most recent Pro Boost winner on tour, Travis “The Carolina Kid” Harvey, Perry will pilot a Harts Charger-boosted Redd Topp Motorsports C7 Corvette owned by Vaughn Myles and Eric Holland. Perry’s father, Danny Perry, and his brother, Daniel Perry, will tune the car along with Harvey’s screw-blown entry.
Perry grew up going to the races with his dad, who has driven and tuned numerous cars in regional Pro Mod competition like Piedmont Dragway’s Big Dog Shootout series. Carson has followed in Danny’s footsteps, getting behind the wheel of anything from his Chevy S10 bracket truck to small-block boost no-time cars. Pro Boost is now the third different PDRA heads-up category Perry has competed in, joining Pro 632 and Super Street on his resume.
The Perry family took delivery of the Corvette last year as a bare roller, one of the last cars built at Vanishing Point Race Cars. The Perrys made some updates and dropped in a Harts Charger-equipped, Noonan-based Pro Line engine between the frame rails. Unlike many of the other centrifugal cars in competition, they opted to use a Lenco transmission.
“We added a bunch of stuff to the car, moved the motor where we wanted it, and my brother wired it,” said Perry, who won the 2025 PDRA Brian Olson Memorial World Finals in Super Street. “Anything we thought of that we wanted to try, we’re trying it on this car. We don’t really try a whole lot of stuff on Travis’s car, considering it’s already fast. So, we’re trying to do something different in little areas here and there, what we think may be faster. This is kind of the test car in a way.”
Perry tested the car twice before loading it up and heading to Bristol. He spent two days testing at Darana Motorsports Park – Benson, NC to get up to speed in the car, then started to get it dialed in at Rockingham Dragway last week. In just a few full runs, Perry laid down numbers that suggest he’ll fit right into the Pro Boost mix this weekend, but he’s keeping his expectations realistic.
“For this weekend, I’m already just happy that I’m going,” said the 23-year-old Perry. “But we would like to qualify good, and I’d be very pleased if we just went a round, honestly. But I already feel like I could win – I wouldn’t go if I didn’t feel like I could win.”
Perry reiterates that the opportunity to merely pull into the lanes beside drivers he’s grown up around, like Harvey and two-time PDRA Pro Boost world champion Jason Harris, is already a win for him. He’s been around Pro Modified racing his whole life, and now he’s set to make his debut in the deep waters of Pro Boost.
“I’m not trying to exaggerate, but I’ve been dreaming about this since I was a little kid – since I can remember,” Perry said. “I’d sit and think about driving a car like this. I’ve helped both Travis and Jason a lot of my life, being with Daddy where he’s been crew chief for them. To race against them, I know they’re the best of the best, so it can’t really get much better than that. I’d like to think that I can be just as good as them one day. Probably not right now, but if I’m going to test how good I am, this is a good place to go. We’re really going to find out then.”
Contributing to the excitement around Perry’s debut is the fact that it’s a family operation, with Danny handling the engine side of things and Daniel getting the car down the track. Perry believes his older brother is one of the rising young talents in the Pro Mod tuning world, with Harvey’s win at the PDRA North vs. South Shootout at Maryland International Raceway serving as an example of his abilities. Harvey ran 3.610, 3.616, 3.610, and 3.595 to earn his second career Pro Boost win.
“Daniel studies the data from the time we get home until we go again,” Perry said. “I’d like to think I could probably tune a car like that, but it wouldn’t be near to the caliber he can, because he’s a perfectionist, you could say. He’ll try his best to make a run as perfect as possible. He may have to slow down a little bit one run to get it back under control, but he tries to be as most consistent as he can. I feel like that showed at Maryland because we ran the same thing every run but the finals.”
Along with the father-son tuning duo, Perry credited car owners Eric Holland and Vaughn Myles for making his debut possible.
“We wouldn’t be doing any of this with Travis or this car if it weren’t for them,” said Perry, who also thanked his mom and his girlfriend. “I’ve known Vaughn a very long time, and to actually get to drive for him…I don’t know how to explain it. It’s pretty unreal, just to finally get to this point.”
The PDRA Thunder Valley Throwdown presented by Larry Jeffers Race Cars at Bristol Dragway will include three Friday pro qualifying sessions at 11:45 a.m., 5:30 p.m., and 9 p.m. Saturday eliminations are scheduled to begin at 11 a.m.
This story was originally published on August 6, 2026. 
The post Carson Perry to Make PDRA Pro Boost Debut at Thunder Valley Throwdown first appeared on Drag Illustrated.
