Hight Takes Denver, Funny Car Points Lead
July 18 - Rookie Robert Hight crushed the competition in the 26th annual Mopar Mile-High Nationals, qualifying No. 1, setting Bandimere Speedway track records for quarter mile time and speed, posting the quickest time in each round of competition and moving past his father-in-law and mentor, John Force, to take over the POWERade points lead.
Hight, 35, drove the Jimmy Prock-tuned Team Castrol/Automobile Club of Southern California Ford Mustang past the Toyota Celica of Phil Burkart Jr. in the Funny Car final, but it was his semifinal conquest of Gary Scelzi and he Oakley Dodge that made him the first rookie in 16 years to top the point standings.
Hight’s heroics saved the day for Team Castrol whose other two drivers, Force and second year pro Eric Medlen, failed to survive beyond round one.
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In the season's first 12 races, Hight qualified no worse than sixth and started either first, second or third eight times. Even more impressive, the 35-year-old former trapshooting champion and former Force crewman had either the quickest or second quickest first round time in 10 races.
No wonder, then, that the blue-and-white Ford and it's rookie driver are attracting so much attention from Force, Scelzi and the other championship contenders.
Scelzi, for one, hasn't found the rookie's performance that surprising. In fact, he all but predicted it.
"Robert Hight will be 'Rookie of the Year,'" he told nhra.com before the season began. "He's a marksman and the concentration he uses in that sport is really helping him in the car. I've seen him test and he'll be a big player."
To Scelzi's dismay, Hight, a former California state trapshooting champion, has made him look like a prophet.
After all, with a half season to go, the father of Force's only grandchild, 10 month old Autumn Danielle Hight, has all but locked up the 2005 Auto Club Road to the Future award that annually identifies the NHRA's Rookie of the Year.
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