Bernstein won the inaugural fall race and has won four times in six final-round appearances here. He also moved ahead of NHRA pioneer "Big Daddy" Don Garlits for No. 2 on the all-time list of Top Fuel winners.

"Garlits is King Kong," Bernstein said. "He made this sport go in the beginning. It's an honor to be in the same room with him. He's still the man. He'd have won a lot more out here if he'd kept going, believe me."

Bernstein called his milestone "an honor" and said he remembered "when I was 17-18 years old, watching him at Bakersfield in 1963. I was there working on the Anderson Brothers' car, as a gofer, wiping tires. I watched him the whole time and was in awe. Who in the world would think a kid at 19 or 20 years old from Texas ever would be able to catch somebody like that?"

He added with a laugh that when he returned to college in Arlington, Texas, after that trip, "The dean said, 'It's time for you to go racing. You're not doing any schoolwork.' "

Bernstein advanced with a semifinal victory over three-time champion Shirley Muldowney, who was bidding to reach her first final round since the October 1, 1989, Topeka race. He beat her by just 0.101 seconds to move on to another classic "beer wars battle" with

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Dixon. It was reminiscent of the 2002 title chase that went down to the penultimate race of the season.

Muldowney, celebrating her 30-year Top Fuel career with a six-appearance "Last Pass" retirement tour, improved her career-best e.t. in beating first-round opponent John Smith with a 4.578-second pass. Then she gave Bernstein a tough go.

"It was not easy. We worked today," Bernstein said, noting that Muldowney gave him an old-fashioned, grind-it-to-the-end run for his $40,000 payout. "Shirley's a great driver, and that's a good team over there. We knew we'd have our hands full. My luck against the women is not very good, so I was pretty shaky on that one. I didn't know if we'd get it done today or not. She's a great competitor and that's a good car and they were running good. It was a great race."

Doug Kalitta, a second-round loser to Tony Schumacher, was unable to parlay his wicked numbers into more than a Round 2 appearance. He also failed to certify his e.t. performance as a national record Sunday; he needed to run the quarter-mile in 4.472 seconds or quicker Sunday.

He said Saturday that his race-day strategy was to be aggressive. "If you back down and try to be conservative, you end up hurting yourself," Kalitta said. "I imagine we'll leave it gassed up and see what happens."

What happened is he had to settle for his startling performance simply to be a Route 66 Raceway record instead of a national one. He had to run a 4.472 Sunday to certify his performance as a national record, and he didn't. So he missed out on earning an extra 20 points, which would have come in handy in his quest to overtake leader Larry Dixon.

Schumacher beat Kalitta with a career-best 4.464-second e.t. that could have become the Top Fuel national record, had he posted a 4.508 or better later in the day. However, he lost a tire-smoking semifinal battle with Dixon.

McClenathan qualified second with the second-quickest run in the sport's history but lost to Muldowney in the second round.

Kenny Bernstein marveled at coming away from the CARQUEST Auto Parts NHRA Nationals with his national e.t. record intact.

He said he figured with quicker performances during the weekend from Doug Kalitta, McClenathan and Schumacher, "this baby will fall this week like a big ol' rock out of the sky.