STEWART POWERS HIS WAY TO ROAD COURSE WIN
Tony Stewart Wins California Road Race Furnished by NASCAR
SONOMA, Calif.--Denny Hamlin bumped and pushed Tony Stewart out of the lead as the pair entered the last lap of Sunday's Sprint Cup race.
A few turns later, it was payback time.
After a few more twists and turns, Stewart put a strong move on Hamlin, which enabled him to go on to his first victory in the last 84 races by .62-seconds.
“I made mistakes the last two laps,” Stewart said. “I had a little too much rear brake in Turn 7 and wheel-hopped it two laps in a row. I felt a nudge when I got down there, and [Hamlin] knew where it was. He did the right thing doing it there, but if I could get to him, he knew what was coming.”
It was a huge for Stewart. After missing the season's first eight races with two broken vertebra's, he knew he had to finish in the top-30 in points and win a race. He is now 32nd, nine points out of 30th.
Even though he was jubilant Sunday in victory lane, Stewart had met with members of the media on Saturday morning and painted a difference picture of how he felt about driving in NASCAR races.
He said that while he still loves to race, he isn't happy behind the wheel of a Sprint Cup car.
Q) WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO MISS THE MOST ABOUT DRIVING IN THE NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES?
“I don't know, after practice this morning not much. I had Jamie McMurray screw us up on a lap. He was trying to do a qualifying lap. Some of the things some of these guys do nowadays doesn't make sense. When we had Dale (Earnhardt) Sr. and Rusty Wallace and Dale Jarrett and those guys they were able to get their arms around these guys and get them to listen and make sense. There is really nobody here that can do that anymore. Everybody is out of control out there.”
Q) YOU ARE STILL COMPETITIVE, WHY ARE YOU STEPPING BACK?
“Because I'm ready to go run stuff that makes me happy and driving a Sprint Cup car does not make me happy right now. Like I said, a lot of things have changed. The atmosphere has changed. There is so much stuff in the garage area that has changed that it was time for me to make a change with it. I've dedicated 18 years of my life to this series and it's done great by me. I've made a great living doing it, but at the same time there are other things in life I want to do other than be at a NASCAR track three days a week for 38 weekends out of 52 weeks a year. There are just other things I want to do now. I never dreamed there was going to be a time that I was going to think about something like this. It wasn't overnight. There were weeks that you would think about 'man I really want to go to Monaco and see the Monaco Grand Prix or I really want to go to Knoxville, Iowa and be out there for the A-main of the Knoxville Nationals or the Kings Royal at Eldora.' There are things I want to do that because of our schedule you don't have time to do it. There is just not enough time to do everything you want to do. It's time for me to do this.”
Q) YOU TALKED EARLIER ABOUT BEING NOSTALGIC THAT THIS IS YOUR LAST NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES RACE AT SONOMA TALK ABOUT THAT AND NEXT WEEK IS GOING TO BE YOUR LAST RACE AT DAYTONA:
“Definitely next week there is nothing I'm going to miss about that. But this has always been a cool place. This track is one where you race the race track. It's you against the track every week. The restarts create the carnage here and guys doing stupid stuff, but when you get into a run and you get a long green flag run like that that is when it's fun here because you are racing the race track and what you've got to do to make yourself fast. It's not that same feeling of wheel to wheel competition that you get other places, but this track is more challenging than the competition is. If you can beat the track, you can win the race too.”
Stewart plans to retire from NASCAR driving at the end of the 2016 season, but it appears he will continue to run selected Sprint car races. He currently owns two Sprint teams that race throughout the country.
“Tony had a very strong car, and I've got to hand it to him, he did what he needed to do at the end,” said Hamlin, who was once a teammate of Stewart's at Joe Gibbs Racing. “He's treated me really well my entire career. It's not like I gave him one by any means. He gave us an opportunity to move him, we did, and then we got it back. It's just part of the deal.”
Joey Logano, the winner at Michigan, took third place. Carl Edwards, who won the pole in Saturday's qualifying, led 24 laps and finished fourth.
Martin Truex, winner of the 2012 Sonoma race finished fifth.
“We started third and didn’t run outside of the top five,” said Truex. “I felt that our Toyota was the best car, we just couldn’t get track position. Every time we would get past the guys that we were racing, a caution would come out and those guys would beat us out of the pits. Little frustrated with that.”
As the 110-lap race was winding down, Truex was in second place, chasing the leader and eventual winner Tony Stewart.
“I took a couple of shots at Tony and knew if I didn’t get by him I’d be packing up and heading backwards which is what happened,” explained Truex. “We just used up the tires at the end, but I had to go for it. Congrats to Tony, it’s good to see and it’s been a long time coming for him.”
The remaining top-10 finishers were: Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch, Ryan Newman, Kasey Kahne, and Kurt Busch.
Top-10 leaders after 16 of 36: 1. Harvick-562, 2. Kurt Busch-528, 3. Edwards-510, 4. Keselowski-506, 5. Logano-493, 6. Elliott-473, 7. Johnson-469, 8. Truex-469, 9. Kyle Busch-451, 10. Kenseth-430.
Note: The points will be reset after race 26, and only the top-16 drivers will advance to the Chase.
BELL GETS GATEWAY TRUCK WIN
Christopher Bell earned his second career Truck Series win Saturday night at East St. Louis, Illinois.
Bell, driver of the No. 4 Kyle Busch Motorsports Toyota, survived a tumultuous second half to edge out Ben Rhodes.
The race was red-flagged three times for incidents. The first for a three-truck incident in Turn 3 on Lap 120 lasted six minutes. The second came 11 laps from the finish for a seven-truck accident in Turn 4 for a total of 10 minutes. The final red flag came out for an incident between Spencer Gallagher and John Wes Townley that lasted 15 minutes. After wrecking each other, the two drivers climbed from their trucks and began fighting.
Daniel Hemric was third, followed by Johnny Sauter, Erik Jones, John Nemechek, German Quiroga, Kaz Grala, Ben Kennedy, and Timothy Peters.
Top-10 leaders after 9 of 23: 1. Byron-226, 2. Crafton-225, 3. Peters-221, 4. Hemric-216, 5. Sauter-204, 6. Nemechek-192, 7. Kennedy-192, 8. Reddick-191, 9. Bell-185, 10. Rhodes-181.
The Xfinity Series teams had an off week,
Top-10 leaders after 14 of 33: 1. Suarez-490, 2. Sadler-469, 3. A. Dillon-455, 4. Allgaier-422, 5. B. Jones-417, 6. Gaughan-412, 7. E. Jones-411, 8. Poole-407, 9. Wallace-373, 10. Reed-331.
Weekend Racing: The Sprint and Xfinity teams are at the 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway. The trucks have the weekend off.
Fri., July 1, Xfinity Series race 15 of 33; Starting time: 7:30 pm ET; TV: NBCSN.
Sat., July 2, Sprint Cup Series race 17 of 26; Starting time: 7:45 ET; TV: NBC.
Racing Trivia Question: At which track does the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship begin?
Last Week's Question? Which team did Kevin Harvick race for before moving to Stewart-Haas Racing? Answer. Richard Childress Racing.
You may contact the Racing Reporter by e-mail at: hodges@race500.com