The Tony Stewart who streaked to a third NASCAR Sprint Cup Series title in 2011 appears back in 2012.
Stewart, who won a record five races in last year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup to clinch the championship in an epic battle with Carl Edwards, is poised for another hot streak as the summer solstice begins. The driver of the No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing comes into Sunday’s Sprint Cup race at the road course in Sonoma, Calif., with the momentum of consecutive podium finishes at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway and Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn.
After back-to-back 25th-place finishes in the races beforehand – May 27 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway and June 3 at Dover (Del.) International Speedway – Stewart has roared back to championship form with a third-place effort June 10 at Pocono and a second-place run last Sunday at Michigan.
Now Stewart comes to Sonoma, the first road-course stop on the Sprint Cup tour. The other is Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International, which welcomes the Sprint Cup Series in mid-August.
Both tracks force drivers to turn left and right, and both have suited Stewart very well. Seven of his 46 career Sprint Cup victories have come on road courses – two at Sonoma and five at Watkins Glen.
One could argue that Stewart is king of the road, for in addition to his seven wins, the three-time Sprint Cup champion has 11 top-twos, 18 top-10s and has led a total of 307 laps in 26 career road course starts. In fact, with only four finishes outside the top-15, Stewart’s average road-course finish is 9.3. At Sonoma alone, Stewart’s two wins (2001 and 2005) are augmented by one pole (2002), two second-place finishes, four top-fives and eight top-10s.
Finishing up front has come in large part from Stewart starting up front. In his 26 road course races, Stewart has started within the first two rows 10 times, and he has qualified in the top-10 16 times.
Proving true the racing adage of, “To finish first, you must first finish,” Stewart has recorded only one DNF (Did Not Finish) in all his road-course starts, which came in last year’s race at Sonoma. There, a dustup with Brian Vickers with less than 25 laps to go sent Stewart from a seemingly surefire second-place result to a career-worst 39th-place road-course finish.
It was a rare blemish on what has become an impressive road-course resume that isn’t limited to Sprint Cup. Outside of NASCAR’s elite series, Stewart scored a road-course win in IROC. He won Round 3 of IROC XXX on the Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway road course en route to the series championship in 2006. Stewart has also competed in the prestigious Rolex 24 Hours At Daytona five times, with a best finish of third in 2005.
So, if you’re looking for a candidate this weekend who embraces both the left and right turns of Sonoma, look no further than Stewart.
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