When the King of Speed warms up your Top Fuel dragster, it’s only natural you would blast to the top of the order.
 
A few short hours after drag-racing legend Kenny Bernstein sat in the Matco Tools Toyota Dragster at Bandimere Speedway, at owner-driver Antron Brown’s invitation, Brown claimed the class’ provisional No. 1 qualifying position Friday night at the Dodge Power Brokers NHRA Mile-High Nationals.
 
“That was some pressure right there, having ‘the king’ come back out and sit in our car,” Brown said after covering the Morrison, Colo., 1,000-foot course in 3.783 seconds at a class-best 327.90-mph speed. “I’m glad we did a representative run for Kenny. He did that all the time.”
 
Brown marveled at the fact Bernstein hasn’t lost his touch.
 
“When he warmed that car up – people don’t realize – he went through all the motions without even thinking about it: put it in reverse, forward, smooth, not grinding the gears, trimming the fuel pump like he was there just yesterday,” Brown said.

 
He called his guest-hosting experience “truly special” and said his run Friday evening was ‘something we can give back to Kenny for all he’s done for our sport. He’s definitely our hero at AB Motorsports.”
 
Considering the challenge of what’s known as “Thunder Mountain,” Brown’s feat was particularly impressive.
 
“Everything is different up here on the mountain,” he said. “When you leave the starting line, you know that you don’t have the power that you do at all the other tracks on tour. The car will take off smooth, but then you’ll know if you’ve got power. The car will either start marching or just labor flat. And if it labors flat, you know it’s not going to be a good run. The first qualifying run today, we had the car tuned up the same, and it had a little fast shake and didn’t make it down. But we knew conditions the next session would be better, so Mark and Brian [crew chiefs Oswald and Corradi] left it alone and just gave it a little more here and there.”

He said that once the race car “got through halftrack and it was hitting on all eight [cylinders], I felt it arch up, and I knew we were on a run. I looked up and saw that 3.78 on the scoreboard, and I knew that was the run we were looking for.”  
 
Brown joined Matt Hagan (Funny Car), Erica Enders (Pro Stock), and Hector Arana Jr. (Pro Stock Motorcycle) atop the leaderboard Friday. Two more Saturday qualifying sessions will set the fields for Sunday’s eliminations.
 
The accomplishment Friday was even more sentimental for Corradi. This was the first venue at which he worked for a pro-level team with Funny Car driver Dean Skuza.