"It was John's idea," Hight said of his boss and 15-time funny-car champion. "'Moneyball' doesn't apply totally to drag racing, but we were looking at statistics and what caused us to get beat last year. I believe it's helping so far."
That's something of an understatement.
Hight has won four straight races this season and finished second in the most recent event at Atlanta. Hight, a two-time defending champion of the Dollar General Summernationals in Topeka, will arrive at Heartland Park this weekend with a commanding 203-point lead in the standings over teammate Mike Neff and nemesis Ron Capps.
Hight believes the "Moneyball" theories of Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane can reduce his maddening inconsistency of last year, when he won five races — including four of the first nine — but was eliminated eight times in first rounds, including the last two races of the regular season and first two in the Countdown playoffs.
"We were all or nothing last year," said Hight, who finished fourth in the standings in 2011. "This year, we took a smarter approach to racing by not giving it away. A lot of times in drag racing, you beat yourself. If we smoke the tires, we didn't get beat by the other guy, we beat ourselves. We didn't give ourselves a fair chance to win that race by going down the track."
So while "Moneyball" emphasized walks, bunts and on-base percentage instead of batting average, slugging percentage and home runs, Hight's Auto Club team focused on small ball for drag racing.
"It's going down the track, not trying to be the quickest car every run," said Hight, the 2009 funny-car champion. "If you're swinging for the fence, you strike out a lot. Hit the ball, go down the track.
"Start the weekend off right. Going down the track on the first qualifying run and step it up each run a little bit and learn from it, rather than going out there and trying to hit the long ball every time and beating yourself. Let the other guy outrun you."
Sure enough, in the season-opening race, Hight was the top qualifier at Pomona. And he promptly lost in the first round to the No. 16 seed, Todd Lesenko.
"There were good conditions, we were playing it safe, and we were weak and shook the tires," Hight said. "We would have been better off being aggressive and running like we know how to do. . . . It can bite you both ways."
But Hight, 42, stuck with the program and promptly reeled off wins at Phoenix; Gainesville, Fla.; Las Vegas; and Charlotte, N.C., before Capps beat him in the third round at Houston and in the finals at Atlanta.
"It's been a dream come true," Hight said of his dominance. "This is stuff that you don't think can happen with the level of competition in funny car today. It's tough to do what we've been doing. We've had a few breaks along the way. A lot of winning is just getting a few breaks, but you make your own, too. A lot of it is the preparation and the hard work over the winter."
Hight, who has won 20 of 23 rounds, won't get complacent with such a large lead in the standings.
"The truth is when they reset the points (for the Countdown), I only have a 30-point lead," he said. "It doesn't matter right now. It's nice to be in the lead and start the weekend at the back of the pack and watch the other funny cars run and know what the conditions are like. That's one perk to being where we are.
"But we're going to go to every race and try to win. We are going to make sure we get the Auto Club Ford qualified very well on Friday, and we may take a run or two on Saturday to start testing and trying things . . . and maybe that's the kind of stuff that will make us better at the end of the year. We can't sit still. We have to be looking for the next hundredths or two we can find out of this race car."
Of his 22 career wins, the two in Topeka are especially meaningful to Hight, who got his NHRA license at Heartland Park and joined John Force Racing at the track.
"We've had a lot of success everywhere," Hight said, "but last year was the first time I ever (successfully) defended a race win. We got the 200th win for JFR last year there. . . . The whole community gets out there and gets behind the drag racing. It is a special place."
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