NHRA News: Kalivoda lands Bill Miller Engineering ride (1/15/2004)

Kalivoda lands Bill Miller Engineering ride

By Rob Geiger, NHRA.com
1/15/2004

"I've been waiting for a chance like this my whole life."
– Brady Kalivoda

Long-time NHRA campaigner Bill Miller has named Brady Kalivoda as the driver of his Bill Miller Engineering Top Fuel dragster. The group will attend 15 of 23 events in 2004 and will debut a new Don Long chassis at the Phoenix test session in early February. Miller, who manufacturers and supplies parts to many of the top teams on the circuit, will serve as crew chief.

Despite the fact Kalivoda has just nine races of Top Fuel experience, Miller says it was an easy decision to select the 30-year-old, second-generation driver to replace Dave Grubnic, who left his team for a ride with Kalitta Motorsports. Miller points to Kalivoda's attitude and persistence in finding a ride as the one of his strongest attributes.

"If you went out searching for a model person to represent the sport of NHRA drag racing, I don't think you could find a better candidate than Brady Kalivoda," Miller said. "He's a good-looking, clean-cut, respectful kid with a dynamite personality and I don't think there are many people who have worked harder to find a ride.

Kalivoda will be driving a much newer
version of this basic Don Long design.
Racers Edge Photography

"I'm good buddies with [crew chief] Mike Kloeber and when I called him to ask his opinion on who I should hire he said, 'Brady, Brady, Brady.' He says, 'Think about it Bill, how many second-generation guys are bad drivers?' You look at guys like Dixon, Kalitta, and Schumacher, and on and on, all second-generation guys, and you see that he's right. Typically, these guys turn out good. I guess insanity runs in the genes.

"We're happy to have him. He's got a valid license, he's ready to go, he can work on the car if we need him to, and he's fired up about life in general, so I feel confident we picked the right person."

Kalivoda won't have too much rust to knock off his helmet, having driven as recently as the Seattle race in late July. He also piloted Rico Anthes' Top Fuel dragster at the 18th annual NitrOlympics in late August at the Motodrom in Hockenheim, Germany.

"I'll be ready to go, are you kidding me?" Kalivoda said. "I've been waiting for a chance like this my whole life. Bill has top-notch stuff and he's always run a clean, professional organization. I'm honored that he selected me to drive his car. On top of everything else, he and his wife, Virgie, are good people. I'm so excited that it's hard to describe."

The 'insanity gene'
The love of drag racing was instilled at a young age for Kalivoda, who grew up in the considerable shadow of his famous drag racing father Dick Kalivoda. Widely remembered for his front-engine Top Fuel dragster, nicknamed "the Joker," which he drove from 1968-'70 in the twilight of his career, Dick was setting records long before Brady was born, mostly in the Northwest's Division 6 near their Seattle home. One of his more prominent rides, the Kalivoda & Hamlin B/Modified Roadster, was so revered it now resides in the Wally Parks Motorsports Museum.

Dick Kalivoda drove this B/Modified Roadster in the early '60s and set the first NHRA record at Pacific Raceways.

"Dad retired before I was born but he stayed close to the sport," Brady said. "My first real contact with drag racing came at Seattle International Raceway when I was 4. Dad hadn't been out of the seat for very long so when we went to the racetrack for the Fall Nationals he pretty much knew everyone.

"Gary Beck was the guy to beat back then and he had bought dad's old car so we were hanging out in his pit. It was quite a different perspective then the average fan would get. I was talking to legends like Herm Peterson and "Gentleman" Hank Johnson, who were big-time Top Fuel stars, especially in Seattle.

"That race got me going and then I started to pick up on what my dad had done and I was like, 'Wow dad, you did this?' I was blown away. That's really the point when I decided I wanted to drive one of these cars."

Taking the necessary steps
In his late teens, Brady attended Frank Hawley's NHRA Drag Racing School and earned a Super Comp license. He used that experience to secure a ride in a nitro-burning, A-Fuel Nostalgia front-engine dragster, which he drove throughout his college days.

Kalivoda last drove this dragster at the FIA-sanctioned NitrOlympics at the Motodrom in Hockenheim, Germany.

After graduating magna cum laude with an accounting degree from Central Washington University. Kalivoda followed his love of the sport to a crewmember's job with Tom Hoover's Pioneer Funny Car team. He has since worked on the race teams of Jim Head, Tony Schumacher, and most recently, Clay Millican, where he worked under Kloeber.

Along the way he let everyone who would listen know that his main goal was to drive a Top Fuel car. Whenever a small window of opportunity would open, Kalivoda was there to take advantage of the situation.

"My first shot came in testing in 1999 when I was working on Jim's dragster," Kalivoda said. "I had always lugged my helmet and firesuit around with me and it finally paid off when he let me make three squirts. It was awesome, everything I knew it would be."

Two years later Kalivoda had a chance to finish up the licensing process and enter a race in Hartman Motorsport's back-up car.

"Virgil [Hartman] said I could drive the car at my home track in Seattle if I lined up some sponsors," Kalivoda said. "So I went to work and found the funding for that one race. Then, John [Smith] got hurt a few races later in Brainerd so they asked me back to finish out the last six races of the year. That certainly wasn't the way I wanted to get a ride but I had to put John's accident out of my mind and learn as much as possible."

In 2002 and 2003, Kalivoda was again limited to his hometown race, and, ironically he logged the only elimination-round win of his career against Bill Miller's car at the '02 meet.

Moving on
"There are a lot of crew guys who want to drive," Kalivoda said. "I always tried to do my best to separate myself from that pack so I always chased down every lead and took any extra job I could, like writing stories for internet sites, or whatever, to keep my name out there.

"I'm happy I learned all the inner workings of the car and I plan to help as much as Bill needs me on our new car. I think my experience as a crewman definitely helped my cause."

Kalivoda's lone elimination-round win in nine NHRA starts came at his home track in Seattle.
Racers Edge Photography

Miller agreed. "These cars are so mechanical that you can't really place a value on how important it is to have a driver that can mentally visualize what's happening behind him," he said. "Brady's pretty much worked every position on the crew so he'll be able to provide us with a lot of feedback right away. That's a big plus.

"I expect us to be competitive right from the start. The car will lack for nothing. We have a brand-new Don Long chassis that is a work of art. It took him three years to build but it's a real masterpiece and it will function as well as or better than any car out there. Of course, we have all the engines and parts we need. We've got the inventory to do what we do.

"We aren't averse to running full-time if the situation was right but we're not going to run 23 races without the necessary ammunition to take on the Bernsteins and Dixons of the world. Right now, most of the funding comes from Bill Miller Engineering. We get great help from Autolite, Clevite, and Red Line Oil, but to move up to full-time we'd need four-times more than we have now.

"We'll stay within our boundaries for now. It'll be fun watching Brady mature as a driver."

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