High-flyer might need to lose weight (8)
I believe the answer is:
jettison
'weight' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both to do with contact as well as being verbs in their base form.
Perhaps you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'high-flyer might need to lose' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'flyer' could be 'jet' (jet is a kind of aircraft) and 'jet' is present in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for jettison that I've seen before include "bin" , "21 [OFFLOAD]" , "Throw overboard or discard unwanted material" , "Reject" , "Abandon, discard" .)