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First Memories of Kenny Bernstein
Words by Chris Martin
Photos by Tim Marshall and Jeff Burk
The sport won't seem the same
without Kenny Bernstein in the saddle. Sure, he'll
be heading up the "Budweiser King" Racing, so
he'll be at the drags and in the corporate red
and white livery, but it will be with son Brandon
behind the wheel. For me, it's sort of like the
deal with Don Prudhomme. It's great to see him
around with his Miller Lite team, but, for guys
like myself who saw him race a lot, the experience
of his driver Larry Dixon Jr. winning the NHRA
Top Fuel crown is not the same as if Prudhomme
had done it himself. Oh well, hopelessly nostalgic
in this corner I guess.
Bernstein's career oozed success. Four NHRA Funny Car titles in a row, two NHRA Top Fuel World Championships, the first guy over 300-mph, and the racer who brought drag racing kicking and screaming into the oaken corporate board rooms with Budweiser, it seemed everything Kenny touched turned to gold. His teams always looked first class. He seemed uncanny in his ability to say the right thing at the right time, and in his ability to get associate sponsors that many racers would like to have had as full-time backers. I guess the popular wisdom was that they'd rather be second fiddle on a proven like Bernstein's rig than gamble on someone they didn't know or possibly respect as much.
Jeff Burk photo
Bernstein's driving career can be broken down
into two distinct periods. His glory years extended
from 1978 through 2002 where he built his Budweiser
racing empire. The other period is not nearly
as well known, but it was where I felt Kenny
got rolling, in other words, got the taste for
winning. Like so many drag race drivers born
in the 1940s, Kenny wasn't like his son or Dixon
Jr. (no knock on the younger drivers). He had
to scramble about getting a ride wherever he
could and some of them were more than a little
interesting. In Bernstein's case, I felt he
first made his mark with a car owned by Lubbock,
Texas racer Prentiss Cunningham. The front-motored
blown and injected Chrysler dragster was called
the "Texas Weasel."
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