1,000 Greatest Drivers: Kenny Bernstein
Writing about series I'm not as knowledgeable about is a drag, man.
As with dirt racing, I admit I don’t know as much about drag racing as I feel that I should. Although I certainly saw many clips of NHRA races while watching RPM2Night, it rarely caught my fancy enough to watch regularly. Much like horse racing, I never much wanted to watch broadcasts that lasted an hour or two with only a couple minutes of racing action, so I may be writing this from a position of ignorance. Nonetheless, although some people in my circles suggested that I shouldn’t include drag racers on my list at all since it is such a distinct discipline from all other forms of car racing, I have come to a different decision in my historical research.
In my opinion, drag racing is essentially a direct descendant of the pursuit of world land speed records, which in the late 19th and early 20th century were significantly historically linked with circuit racing. Plenty of the world’s greatest drivers especially prior to the start of World War II competed in both circuit races (usually either Grand Prix or IndyCar races) while also competing for world land speed records. These include the first two world land speed record holders Gaston de Chasseloup-Laubat and Camille Jenatzy (who each set the record three times and also won pre-1906 Grand Prix races), Vanderbilt Cup winner Victor Hémery, and Indy 500 winners René Thomas and Ray Keech. Even Malcolm Campbell and Henry Segrave, who are far better known for their speed records, both won multiple Grand Prix races in the 1920s. Segrave even won eight. Several elite drivers in other disciplines of motorsports like Frank Lockhart and Marshall Teague died while attempting to set speed records. Clearly the early history of open wheel racing and speed records were directly linked. What drag racers like Bernstein were doing is literally a direct descendant of this in my opinion. Obviously, drag racers in this era generally aren’t as diverse as the racers of that earlier era so I will ding them somewhat on my versatility metrics. However, Bernstein was certainly more diverse than most drag racers since he became the first driver to win both NHRA Top Fuel and Funny Car titles and he also won races in other sanctioning bodies like the IHRA and AHRA as well. Although many people who follow various forms of circuit racing act like either the competition is dismissible, that it is all reaction time, no talent, or the fact that the races are so short means I should only have various circuit and rally drivers on the list. To that, I again respond with the fact that drag racing was historically linked with circuit racing in the past and I don’t criticize the specialists in other disciplines for not crossing over so I shouldn’t do so here either. And Bernstein of course did cross over.
To an extent, this is apples and oranges however as coming up with a precise way to determine which tiers a drag racer should be in relative to drivers in other series is quite difficult. I am almost entirely going to base this on some combination of winning percentage, points finishing positions, and the number of elapsed time or top speed records that driver set in a given year. I have a list of all winners and top ten points finishers for the three main NHRA series (Top Fuel, Funny Car, and Pro Stock). I’m not doing Pro Stock Bikes because I have decided not to include motorcycle racers in this project under the pedantic argument that they are riders, not drivers. I have found a link that contains a list of every record in NHRA history, which has been very effective in helping me to do single-season evaluations because obviously to a certain extent, setting all-time elapsed time and speed records can even be more important than winning, and sometimes the record-setters don’t win their races, as Bernstein failed to do when he became the first driver to hit 300 mph in NHRA competition in 1992. Generally, I think any driver who wins a Top Fuel, Funny Car, or Pro Stock title should at least make the top 100 for that year and any driver who sets an elapsed time or top speed record in one of those three series should make the top 200, but I’ll likely make exceptions to both of those.
I think NHRA racing was very significant in the period Bernstein raced although I suspect I’m going to rate drivers lower from both the very early and very recent years because it does seem the NHRA did not have much prestige in the ‘70s and then it again faded to become a less prestigious series around the time they changed their races from lasting ¼ mile to 1,000 feet and added a playoff system. I probably won’t rate equivalent seasons from the ‘60s/’70s or 2010s/2020s as highly as I will in the 1980s-2000s when the series was in the highest public consciousness. I think it’s very reasonable to give Bernstein and John Force E’s in their best seasons but I don’t think I will be doing the same for Steve Torrence. However, I realize it isn’t as difficult as circuit or rally racing, so I don’t think I’m going to put any drag racers in the top five for a year (except maybe the pioneering ones I mentioned in the second paragraph). Regardless, I felt I needed to write this lengthy preamble because I know there are many people who would argue that drag racers shouldn’t be listed at all, but I would vastly rather select legendary drag racers than scrape the bottom of the barrel in more famous series and list the likes of Dave Marcis, Ed Carpenter, or Richie Ginther. I think that should be understandable. (I might change my mind about Marcis, but we’ll see.)
