Tony Stewart is so good at the relatively niche art of road racing that he might as well add a few umlauts to his name, at least for this weekend as the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series invades the 11-turn, 2.45-mile road course that is Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International.
For years, road racing was considered a European hallmark, where Formula One reigns supreme and oval racetracks are vastly outnumbered by the twists and turns of the continent’s seemingly endless supply of road courses. Drivers with such names as Lewis, Jenson, Nigel, Mika, Sebastian, Kimi and Fernando are most often thought of as the premiere road-course talent.
But here in the good, ol’ U.S. of A, it’s a guy named Tony who reigns supreme, as Stewart’s five Sprint Cup wins at The Glen suggest.
The driver of the No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing comes from working-class roots in Columbus, Ind., yet he possesses otherworldly driving skills that would put such Formula One champions as Mika Häkkinen (1998-1999) and Kimi Räikkönen (2007) to the test if they dared cross the Atlantic to compete at The Glen as their Formula One predecessors did from 1961 through 1980.
Since 1999 when Stewart began racing “tin-tops” at Watkins Glen as a Sprint Cup rookie, he’s collected the most wins of any driver in Sprint Cup. His first win came in 2002, with subsequent trips to victory lane in 2004, 2005, 2007 and 2009.
In his 13 career Sprint Cup starts at The Glen, Stewart has only three finishes worse than seventh – 26th in 2001, 11th in 2003 and 27th in 2011. He has an average start of 6.2 and an average finish of 7.1.
Bolstering Stewart’s legend at The Glen is his success at the Sprint Cup Series’ other road course venue in Sonoma, Calif. There, Stewart has two wins, three second-place finishes, five top-fives and nine top-10s in his 14 career Sprint Cup starts, giving him an average finish of 10.9.
Tally it all up and Stewart has seven road-course wins and only four finishes lower than 15th – 26th at Watkins Glen in 2001, 28th at Sonoma in 2006, 39th at Sonoma in 2011 and 27th at Watkins Glen in 2011. His average road-course finish is ninth, which is due in large part to having recorded only one DNF (Did Not Finish) in his 26 career road-course races and earning a lap completion rate of 99.2 percent.
Adding fuel to Smoke’s fire is that he comes into Watkins Glen with a string of gritty finishes. The three-time and reigning Sprint Cup champion has scored seven top-12s in the last eight races – five of which were top-fives, including a win July 7 at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway. All of those drives have been hard earned, as Stewart’s average start was 23rd, but he constantly rallied to score an average finish of 8.4.
Among those rallies was the June 24 visit to the road course in Sonoma, where Stewart qualified 24th and then muscled his way to second place before the checkered flag dropped. The same Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevy that Stewart wheeled at Sonoma will be underneath him this weekend at The Glen, where Stewart plans to finish one spot higher than he did in Sonoma.
A win at The Glen would give Stewart four wins on the season and sole possession of the No. 1 seed in the 12-driver Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, which begins Sept. 16 at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill. Currently, Stewart shares the top spot with Jimmie Johnson and Brad Keselowski, both of whom are three-time winners this season.
Stewart’s multiple victories allow him to forget about points and go for even more wins. He’s a lock to qualify for his eighth Chase, where each regular-season wins carries three bonus points to start the 10-race Chase. It’s a margin Stewart didn’t have in 2011, when he entered the Chase winless yet rallied to score a record-setting five wins to take his third Sprint Cup championship.
Intent on defending that title, Stewart is looking for another championship ring in 2012, and a win in Sunday’s Finger Lakes 355k at The Glen could very well give bring some more bling to his fingers when the Sprint Cup season culminates Nov. 18 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
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