Light, a 25-year-old native of West Springfield, Penn. now living in Indianapolis, captured the Lawrenceburg Speedway sprint car title this past season, his first track championship. Along the way Light endured a bone-jarring crash that nearly wiped out his operation, and the late-season theft of his transport truck and trailer.

“I had always wanted to win a championship, but had never focused on points,” said Light. “I was always running around looking for bigger money races, and I didn’t concentrate on just one track, or a points race.

“But leaving Pennsylvania and coming to Indiana, winning a championship is kind of cool. Not very many guys from that area have won championships out here.”

The year began with the newly-configured Lawrenceburg track opening late due to construction, and racers immediately discovered The Burg bore very little resemblance to the previous quarter-mile oval. The new track is much bigger, steeper, and faster.

“It was a big learning curve for everybody,” says Light. “The size, shape, banking, everything is different. And you can’t compare this track to anywhere else around here, because it’s very different. That’s why I like it better, because it’s unique. It’s bigger than any of the other Indiana tracks, and it’s fast.”

Light was consistent throughout the season, but suffered a major setback during Indiana Sprint Week when he crashed hard at the Burg.

“The year had a rough start, I tried a different chassis and that didn’t work too well,” he admits. “I finally bought a new DRC chassis and was getting going pretty good when we had that bad crash during Sprint Week and that just about wiped me out.

“Luckily, Joe Devin of DRC had another chassis available, and I managed to find enough spares and stuff to get a car together to keep racing.”

Light raced throughout Indiana this past season, but each Saturday night found him at Lawrenceburg. His consistency propelled him into the point lead by August, although Light was originally unawares of his position atop the standings.

“We were kind of running all over the place, and I had no idea where we were in the points,” he says. “One day my mom called and said she’d seen on the track’s website that we were leading the points, and I was shocked.

“Once I realized we had a shot at the title, we focused a lot more on points. We were already planning on running all the Lawrenceburg shows, but we wanted to stay consistent and try to win the title.”

By season’s end, Light held a comfortable lead over Joss Moffatt and Logan Hupp. It was a happy ending to the season, and Light and crew chief Joe Dietsch could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

Light isn’t yet sure of his plans for 2009.

“We had some help this past year, and that’s what enabled us to race,” he says. “Horsepower, Inc.; Simpson Race Products; Integrated Machine Co.; Comp Cams; they were with us all the way. We’ll just see what everybody wants to do for next year.

“I’m working on trying to find a ride with somebody else, and I’ll know more about that sometime in December. If that doesn’t pan out, I’ll put my own deal together again for next season.”

The last four years have been something of a storybook journey for Light, who raced go-karts as a kid in Pennsylvania. He came to the Midwest with a Ford Focus midget in 2004, and worked as a fabricator for Beast Chassis for about a year-and-a-half. He purchased a sprint car in late 2006, and has followed the bellowing beasts ever since.