CHAMPION: The name Big Bad Charlie Berntsen is legend in the New Zealand stockcar scene. PHOTO/FILE 21102015WCSUPCHARLIE
CHAMPION: The name Big Bad Charlie Berntsen is legend in the New Zealand stockcar scene. PHOTO/FILE 21102015WCSUPCHARLIE
Stockcar legend Charlie Berntsen was an entertainer, prankster and a good man.
The former New Zealand stockcar champion will be remembered for his good nature just as much as his prowess and daring on the track.
Of Danish heritage, Charlie's family traces back to the first settlers of Dannevirke. Charliewas a blocklayer by trade and moved to Wanganui from Palmerston North, where he first established himself in the stockcar scene, in 1972.
Charlie began his stockcar-driving career in the 1962/63 season as part of the Palmerston North Panthers team behind the Brew 22P car.
It was his exceptional talent and drive to push the limits which earned him the nickname Big Bad Charlie early on in his career. He won the first ever race on the Wanganui speedway in October 1972, before becoming the first Wanganui winner of the nationals in the 1981/82 season in the now famous 432V car.
Charlie put his body on the line in the name of entertaining the punters, no time more famously than when he got into a coffin in the middle of the track. The plan was, unbeknown to the crowd, that the car was to run safely over the coffin and Charlie would emerge and run to the pits. It went wrong and the car ended up ripping his knee apart.
Berntsen retired from racing in 1985 but was the patron of the club, with an annual trophy named after him. Off the track, Charlie selflessly helped others in the pits. Outside stockcar racing, he was a family man, enjoying activities such as collecting, inventing, tinkering and competing in 4x4 rallies with his wife Ann.
Carl Neville (Charlie) Berntsen died on October 13 in Wellington Hospital. He was 76 years old. His funeral was held in the Eulogy Lounge at the Wanganui Function Centre in Purnell St on Tuesday.
