7th title goal for sport’s legend

Thursday, April 4, 2002 | 11:36 a.m.

As he starts his 24th and final National Hot Rod Association season, Kenny Bernstein would like nothing more than to cap a stellar career with a seventh NHRA championship.

If he doesn't, however, Bernstein said he will retire at season's end with no regrets.

"There won't be any (regrets) if we don't win it -- only because of the success we had last year," Bernstein said as he prepared his Budweiser King dragster for this weekend's third annual SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

"Last year took a tremendous amount of pressure off of us by winning, because it put everybody at ease that we were still capable of doing that after a couple years of having rough times.

"When people get toward the end of their career and they don't have success, the first thing people start thinking is 'well, they don't care as much anymore.' We put that to rest, which was the most important thing to me because I cared as much when that was going on as back in the '80s."

Bernstein, 57, claimed his first NHRA Top Fuel championship since 1996 last year by winning eight races and posting four runner-up finishes. It was Bernstein's second Top Fuel title after winning four Funny Car championships from 1985 to 1988.

"I think we'll have success this year regardless of whether we win the championship or not," said Bernstein, who has 61 NHRA wins. "All an athlete asks, really, is to be competitive and if you're competitive and you've given everything you can and you (still) lose, you can accept it then.

"If you're not competitive and you felt like you left something out there, that's a different story. But I don't feel that way today and I certainly don't think I will feel that way at the end of the season. I know that we're competitive already because we've been in two finals and we're right there with them; we just need to get a break or two and win a race."

The way things have worked out for Bernstein the past two years, he said Las Vegas is the ideal place for the breaks to start falling his way.

After a winless 1999 season, Bernstein proved to himself and the drag-racing world that he still was capable of winning by snapping a 23-race winless streak in the inaugural NHRA national event in Las Vegas in the spring of 2000.

Last year, Bernstein repeated as the Top Fuel winner in Las Vegas in the spring and then advanced to the finals at the inaugural fall event at The Strip, where he lost to Darrell Russell.

Bernstein said there is no rhyme or reason to his success at The Strip.

"It's just one of those things that has happened," he said. "There's no magic there and there's nothing that's any different than at any other racetrack as far as conditions or anything. We've just had a good program the three times we've come over here so it's just worked out that way."

Bernstein comes to Las Vegas trailing front-runner Larry Dixon by 105 points in the Top Fuel standings. After waging a thrilling battle with Dixon for the season championship last year, Bernstein said he believes he can give Dixon and the Don Prudhomme-owned Miller Lite dragster another run this year.

"We're in good shape," Bernstein said. "We've had a battle with that team since last year. With about 10 races to go in the season, it was just a tremendous battle and it has continued again the first three races this year.

"In all reality, they've got a good program going right now and they may be just a teeny bit ahead of us at this stage, but it's early in the game and I'm real confident in (crew chief) Tim Richards and our team to be able to get right back in this thing and give them a run right to the end."