"Close but no Cigar", may have been a line in the 1935 film version of Annie Oakley, but 3/4 of the way through this NHRA season it could've been the title of Funny Car Driver Robert Hight's autobiography.

　Hight, who was the 2005 Auto Club’s Road to the Future Award as the Rookie-of-the-Year, was thought of as the John Force Racing driver with the best chance to win an NHRA Full Throttle Funny Car Championship. He had finished second in the season ending points twice, losing out on the last day of the season; in 2009 he was about to miss out on the Countdown to Championship altogether. The drag racing world was starting to think of Robert as someone who could get close, but not quite over the hump.

Boy did things change. Hight, his crew chief Jimmy Prock, and the rest of his AAA Auto Club team caught fire in "The Countdown" and never looked back.

Hight clinched the 2009 NHRA Funny Car Championship following Saturday's qualifying session in Pomona. There is nobody who has worked harder, or paid his dues more than Robert. And as good a driver he is, from my viewing point, seeing and talking to him at a couple races each year, he is even a nicer person.

What happens in the eliminations on Sunday could be the icing on the cake for Robert, and John Force Racing if Robert wins another Wally. In the ever-changing world of drag racing, I'm sure Robert will be around for the long haul.

Maybe now when people refer to Robert Hight, they will say he was the 2009 NHRA Funny Car Champion, and not just John Force's Son-in-law.