Flashback Friday: Colorado Nitro Legend Junior Kaiser

Racers, fans, and hot rodders in the mile high city of Denver and the surrounding area will certainly recall the name Junior Kaiser. And despite few lasting accolades on a national scale, he played a role in a pivotal piece of racing history and built up a resume worthy of enshrinement in an exclusive hall of fame in his home state.

Kaiser attended his first drag race in 1955 at Colorado’s Lowry Air Force Base at the age of 16. At the time, like many of his peers, Kaiser was a street racer, tearing up the streets of the Washington Park area of Denver in his Henry J powered by a Chevy V8. After his brother Jerry totaled the Henry J, Junior transplanted the engine to a ’27 Model T Coupe. And in 1958, taking a big leap, he built a Top Fueler powered by a 389-inch Pontiac.

Junior took top eliminator honors at Continental Divide Raceway in 1960, defeating hall of famer Roy Golighty at a speed of 134 MPH. He would continue racing at Continental until moving to the drag racing-rich land of California, where with the help of his brother, Junior raced at tracks all over the state virtually every weekend. Several years later, they returned to Colorado and installed a GMC 671 blower on the Pontiac engine, help Junior to become one of three drivers in Colorado to exceed 150 MPH in 1962. Junior also opened his own high performance engine shop, Kaiser Enterprises, Hi Pro Engines, which is now operated by his son and daughter-in-law.

In a combined effort with Mike Collins, Mike Widner, and Mark Williams, Kaiser developed a rear engine Top Fuel Dragster that the Kaiser brothers raced for more than a decade. Don Garlits, still a few months shy of debuting his own rear engine car, became a rather interested spectator in this new car design. Kaiser won some Division 5 points meets in the car, but it was overshadowed in the history books by Garlits’ Winternationals debut victory.

“I saw the [Kaiser] car run at several WCS meets and at Ontario and Pomona — all before Garlits debuted his car. Fact is, this car ran straight and strong — but I believe it never won anything more than a Division 5 points race. If Junior Kaiser would have had a state-of-the-art elephant motor instead of a budget cast-iron 392, who knows how history would have played out?” exclaimed former National Dragster Editor Bill Holland in an NHRA.com interview.

Driving the Kaiser Brothers Top Fueler, Junior captured the 1980 and 1982 NHRA Division 5 championship and was ranked ninth in the nation in 1982. During the late 80’s and into the early 90’s Junior was a regular at one race and one race only – his hometown Bandimere Speedway for the NHRA Mile-High Nationals. Although with far less resources and data at his disposal, Junior knew how to race on the mountain and certainly was no pushover, as evidenced by his opening round rout of Gene Snow in 1990, seen in the video below.

Kaiser downing Gene Snow in round one at the 1990 Mile-High Nationals in Denver
https://youtu.be/QZcg-fAsDb0

Junior closed out his driving career partnered with Bill Rice before retiring from driving in 1996 at the age of 57.

In 2007, Kaiser was inducted into the Colorado Motorsports Hall of Fame, where he joining an exclusive list of drag racing, open wheel, stock car, and other racing legends. Along with son Troy, Kaiser still remains involved with the sport through his racing ventures, which has included an A/Fuel Dragster in the NHRA Top Alcohol Dragster category and a vintage, alcohol-burning front engine dragster in nostalgia events.

Kaiser’s other recent involvement in the world of motorsports is decisively different from the straight line racing he’s accustomed to, as he handles the duties of pit support and the unofficial team chef for the Strobal Motorsports Chevy Silverado Trophy Truck in the Best in the Desert Off-Road Racing Series.