Stewart and Co. Rally to Top-10 at Darlington

At one point in the Southern 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race Saturday night at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway, Tony Stewart was two laps down and outside the top-25. But when the checkered flag waved on the 65th annual race at the venerable 1.366-mile oval, Stewart was ninth.

It was an incredible rally for Stewart, crew chief Chad Johnston and the entire No. 14 Bass Pro Shops/Mobil 1 team of Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR.) It was the group’s fourth top-10 of the season and it moved Stewart up two spots in the championship point standings to 12th.

“To end up ninth after where we were most of the race, we’ll take it,” said Stewart, who now has 12 top-10s in 22 career Sprint Cup start at Darlington. “We were stuck in traffic all night, but right at the end, we were able to make some headway and get a top-10.”

Stewart started 23rd and while he was able to crack the top-20 and rise to 17th by lap 64, he was back in 23rd by lap 100 as his Bass Pro Shops/Mobil 1 Chevy was too tight through the track’s corners. This handling condition stayed with Stewart throughout the majority of the race, and with a blistering pace being set by his SHR teammate Kevin Harvick, who ended up leading seven times for a race-high 238 laps en route to winning the Southern 500, Stewart eventually was mired in traffic and two laps down.

When the caution came out on lap 359 for fluid on the racetrack, Stewart radioed that his car was the best it had been. The constant tinkering Johnston had performed on the Bass Pro Shops/Mobil 1 Chevy on each and every pit stop paid off. Stewart’s lap times were as good as the leaders, but they were seemingly irrelevant since Stewart wasn’t on the lead lap.

But thanks to some fortuitous caution periods and smart pit strategy by Johnston, Stewart earned his way back onto the lead lap. Still, he was stuck in traffic, all the way back in 21st position with only a handful of laps remaining.

But a caution for debris on lap 366 pushed the race into overtime, setting up a green-white-checkered finish. Johnston called Stewart to the pits for four fresh tires and no fuel, which meant Stewart’s car had plenty of grip and nowhere near the weight of his competitors.

Stewart restarted 13th and shot into the top-10 until the caution flag waved for the final time for Kurt Busch’s spin on the backstretch. In the next attempt at a green-white-checkered, Stewart muscled his way to ninth and held onto the spot until the finish. It was his 294th top-10 in 529 career Sprint Cup starts.

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