GO, GO, GRANNY : Cunningham Says She Plans to Return to Drag Boat Racing

Jacque (Jackie) Cunningham, a 54-year-old grandmother from Simi Valley, has thought for some time that she ought to be in the “Guinness Book of World Records.” She figures there should be a category for the world’s oldest woman drag boat racer.

If she ever makes it, she can also try for another category: The world’s oldest woman drag boat racer to flip her 3,000-pound boat and get pitched into the water while going 116 m.p.h.

Mom, as her fellow racers call her, was qualifying her pro gas jet boat, Midnite Oil, on Firebird Lake, near Phoenix recently when a gust of wind caught the left side of the boat and gently lifted it up.

“I knew I’d had it right then,” she recalled. “There was no recovery time. One second, the boat was running smooth right at the finish line, and the next second, it was lifting.”

The boat flipped when its right side dug into the water and then did a barrel roll before crashing upside down and sinking. Fortunately, Cunningham was thrown clear.

“Not exactly thrown clear,” she said. “I took the side of the boat out with my ribs. At first, it buffeted me around inside, and I hit the steering wheel with my helmet. Then the centrifugal force took over and out I went.”

When doctors checked her at the hospital, they found five broken ribs on her right side, a broken rib in her back, a broken left foot, a broken right index finger and internal bleeding.

“I felt like I had been mugged,” she said. “I had bruises on places that I never knew how they got there.

“When I felt I was in the air, the first thing I did was close my eyes. I had heard of people getting brain damage from hydraulics in their eyes, but I could feel myself flying. I split my pants open and landed spread-eagled on my back. I thought my kidneys would bust. I was never scared, but I was concerned about my kidneys.

“I can’t say enough for the rescue people. The diver was alongside me immediately. When they put me on the board for the ambulance, I told the guys they were lucky that I’d lost 25 pounds during the off-season.”

The worst thing about the incident, she said, was when the ambulance driver couldn’t find his way out of the park.

“I was furious,” she said. “My husband had to give them directions how to get out.”

The next-worst thing was the taste of the water in Firebird Lake.

“I told (race promoter) Charlie Allen that he ought to drain the lake and fill it with Perrier. That stuff he’s got in there tasted awful. I was spitting out water as fast as I could.”

The boat, a Cheyenne hull with an IRA engine, came out worse than its driver. The whole right side and half the back were ripped off before it sank in 15 feet of water.

“It’s in the dumpster,” Cunningham said.

And what is an IRA engine?

“I cashed in my IRA accounts to buy the engine, so that’s what I call it.”

Cunningham has been racing boats for nine years, but this was her first flip.

“I’ve come close to flying it before, but once I lost sight of the horizon I backed off,” she said. “This one came too suddenly to back off.”

It wasn’t the first flip in the family, however. Jackie’s husband, Bob, crashed in a jet drag boat race at Parker, Ariz., and broke his neck in two places, his back and his pelvis.

“He raced a few times after that, but one day he said to me, ‘To be honest, you’re quicker than me. Why don’t you do the driving and I’ll do the motor work.’ ”

The boat is No. 46 because that’s how old Jackie was when she drove her first race.

As landlubbers, the Cunninghams were drag racers 25 years, ago when there was racing at Lions in Wilmington, Bakersfield, Fontana, Colton, Irwindale and San Fernando Valley.

“We raced with guys like Don Garlits and Tommy Ivo and the Hawaiian,” she said. “We raced slingshots and rear engines.

“Then we sold everything and moved to Big Bear. We bought a ski boat and used to take the boys to the river to water ski. One day, we saw a drag boat race and we looked at each other and knew right then that we were going to do it.”

What’s next for the 5-foot 1-inch grandmother who got the cast off her left foot last Monday?

“I’ll be back,” she said. “It’s like being in a traffic accident. You don’t quit driving just because of that, but it will be a while yet. We still have to build a new hull.

“If I still have the edge, I’ll continue to drive. If my response time is slow, maybe we’ll get another driver, or just help someone else. We’d never leave drag boat racing. It would be like walking away from our family.

“Actually, our racing family is more forgiving than blood relatives. A lot of people on the outside don’t understand our love for racing, but the ones in it understand one another and help one another.”

Jackie Cunningham doesn’t think her driving is a statement for senior citizens, even though she will be 55 this year. She sees it as a statement for children.

“At the race course, I’m Grandma to all the kids, not just my own two grandchildren. When kids see me in the pits or in the boat waiting to make a run, they all yell, ‘There’s Grandma,’ or ‘Hi, Grandma, I hope you win today.’ I feel like they’re all my grandchildren.”

She got her biggest thrill in racing last January at the International Hot Boat Assn. awards dinner. She was there to get her second-place award for high points in her class, but she got something more.

“I was voted driver of the year, not by points, but by a vote of my fellow drivers,” she said. “It was the most precious thing I’ve ever won, the respect of the guys I race against all year. It was quite a moment for me.”