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Call in the psychic detectives.

After five NHRA POWERade national events, the most bewildering and bemusing category on four wheels has been the Funny Car class, and here is just a sample of the corroborating evidence:

• So far in 2008, there have been no repeat winners.

• Ashley Force is winless, yet leads the POWERade points (for the first time in her career) on the strength of two consecutive final-round appearances.

• Ron Capps failed to win a single round of racing until the most recent event in Las Vegas.

• Tim Wilkerson, one of the few remaining team owners in the class who campaigns a single car and works on his own machine, boasts the most impressive all-around stats so far this year with two No. 1 qualifying starts and a victory.

• Robert Hight began the year with a win and a runner-up finish, but since then has won a single round of racing accompanied by a DNQ in Houston. After qualifying No. 1 in Las Vegas, he lost in Round 2 to lopsided underdog Bob Bode.

• John Force, Gary Scelzi, and Tony Pedregon -- who represent a combined total of 20 career POWERade championships and 199 national event wins -- have amassed a grand total of 12 round wins this season.

• Del Worsham began 2008 with two DNQs and a single round win before his Houston victory. At the next race in Vegas, he fell in Round 1 after qualifying 11th.

The prosecution rests.

What has contributed to the dipsy doodle in the Funny Car universe? That's a hard question to answer, but in conversations with a number of veteran racers, the overarching opinion is that parity has arrived in this category with both feet.

"For a long time, there was a short list of teams that you could pretty much be assured would lead the pack," said Pedregon, the reigning POWERade champion. "But take a look at some of the teams in the class now who can run with anyone. Tim [Wilkerson] can beat you, Bob Tasca is getting more dangerous with each race and, of course, Ashley [Force] has a great team behind her and she's proving she has the ability to win.

"We've had our ups and downs this year, but so has everyone else. I think the days of one driver, like a John Force, running away from everyone else may be over."

First-year Funny Car star Melanie Troxel agrees.

"Every team has been fighting for consistency this year," said the driver of Mike Ashley's ProCare RX F/C. "When that happens, you see strange things happening on race day. Just the fact that nobody has won two races in a row this year is proof that the playing field is as level as it's ever been, and it gives some of the teams which have had to fight a little harder to contend for the championship a better chance."

While some fans might point to the newly applied rules governing the safety equipment and chassis construction in Funny Car as a reason for the puzzling scramble we've seen in 2008, John Force disagrees.

"Everyone gets their hand from the same deck," he said. "We've been told we have an advantage because we were the ones who pushed for these changes after Eric [Medlen] died last year. But if you take a look at what my team has done this year, we've been running hot and cold like everyone else. Right now, I wish we did have an advantage, but when things are as unpredictable as they are, it's always good for the fans."

With 19 POWERade events remaining on the 2008 schedule, and a revised Countdown to the Championship format in place that will give teams an even broader window of opportunity for making the final cut in the title chase, this year's Funny Car firefight has just begun to heat up. It's hard to imagine the decisive stages of this year's F/C championship stretch drive being any more dramatic than the ones we've seen over the past three years -- all of which were clinched at the season finales in Pomona -- but if the opening rounds of the '08 slate are any indication, the best is yet to come.

"That's why we do this," John Force said. "If we already knew what was going to happen, we'd just stay home."

Bill Stephens covers NHRA for ESPN.com.