Killed at his local track, where he was a legend, when a tyre burst and pitched him into a series of crashes. An engineer of some note, Karnatz, of Hungarian origin, was an apprentice mechanic at Chrysler in Detroit when he met Bill White, who owned racing cars which Shorty Cantlon and Billy Arnold drove. Bert became their - and White's - mechanic, but then also took up racing, become a particular specialist in board track racing, winning one of the last major events on the surface at Woodbridge, New Jersey, in 1931. Aside from his Indianapolis 500 efforts, Karnatz larged raced in dirt track racing until his death at a track that had seen him win many times previously.

Biography last updated 19 Sep 2016