Stewart just can’t seem to get enough wheel time
der an assumed name and drove an old junker he bought during a poker game the night before.
Naturally, he won, but it wasn’t until he took off his helmet in victory lane that the track announcer and race fans recognized it was none other than “Smoke.”
It makes you wonder why Stewart didn’t take up and fly over to Canyon Raceway in Peoria to race in their event this weekend, too.
I guess a guy can’t be in places at once, but seriously, since Stewart didn’t participate in Saturday’s Nationwide race, I halfway expected to see him behind the wheel of the pace car they let me sit in to start the Dollar General 200.
“Smoke” does get around, you know. After last week’s scary Nationwide crash at Daytona, which injured multiple fans when pieces of metal and other car debris tore through a chain-link fence, he took it upon himself as the race winner to meet with many of them in the hospital.
“It was good. It was a good visit,” Stewart said.
When he’s not serving as Mr. Good Guy or finding another dirt track somewhere to conquer, Stewart is busy running a multimillion-dollar enterprise known as Stewart-Haas Racing, which also employs drivers Danica Patrick and Ryan Newman and soon, Kevin Harvick.
Owning his own race team has been Stewart’s dream for years and it allows him the luxury of roaming the countryside in search of his next short-track adventure. It’s why he ultimately decided to leave Joe Gibbs Racing, because Joe Gibbs didn’t want him gallivanting around like some sort of barnstormer fueled up on blood, dirt, gas and oil.
Now he does it all and when the Sprint Cup Series returns to Phoenix in November, don’t be surprised if Stewart heads back to Yuma to pull more double duty. Yep, little Cocopah Speedway will be racing that very same weekend once again.
“I hope we’re in a position where we’re worrying about the Cup car by then,” Stewart said, “but if not it wouldn’t hurt my feelings to be able to come out and race a couple of nights again.”
Yeah, it’s just never enough for Stewart, who’s always wanting more, more, more. One day, he even plans to give it a whirl in a Top Fuel dragster.
“I want to drive over 300 mph in one,” he said.
Oh, brother. What’s next, jet boats or the Space Shuttle? All I know is that I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have any interest in driving my 2004 canteen-green Nissan Xterra. Thank God.