Kalitta and Bernstein had met four times prior in final rounds in their careers with each driver claiming two victories. Kalitta was able to break the tie between the two Top Fuel stalwarts with yet another great pass on Thunder Mountain and get the win light, 3.963/308.35 to 4.003 /297.35.

“What an awesome day for me and the Kalitta Air team,” Kalitta, a 45-year-old resident of Ann Arbor, Mich., said “I just can’t say enough about Jim ‘O’ (Oberhofer, crew chief) and Troy (Fasching, assistant crew chief) and our whole Kalitta Air/Kalitta Motorsports team. Our team worked really hard to get this win, and it was a long time coming.

“We’ve been so close a few times this year and we’ve been close a few times here at Bandimere, so to get this win is really gratifying. Connie (Kalitta) has put together an amazing team and group of people, and we’re all very proud to get this win for him.”

Kalitta joins his uncle Connie and his late cousin Scott Kalitta as Top Fuel winners in Denver. Connie, known in his days as a driver as “the Bounty Hunter”, won Denver consecutively in 1984 and 1985. Scott was a three-time winner at Bandimere Raceway with trophies in 1994, 1995 and 2004.

Kalitta continued, “Yeah, that means a lot to me. There aren’t that many tracks that we’ve all won at, so it really is something special to me and the whole Kalitta family.”