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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Despite Vegas Disappointment, Stewart Riding High
Owner/driver Tony Stewart carries the NASCAR Sprint Cup point lead into race four at Bristol…
Mike Hembree  |  Posted March 10, 2011   Charlotte, NC
Tony Stewart is the most recent NASCAR Sprint Cup champion not named Jimmie Johnson. (Photo: Getty Images)
Tony Stewart was about as unhappy as a second-place finisher could be after Sunday’s Sprint Cup race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Second these days can be a good thing, particularly in the long, long run to September and Chase qualification. For Stewart, however, second is almost never acceptable, and it was particularly wretched at Las Vegas.

Stewart led 163 of the 267 laps in the Kobalt Tools 400 and clearly had the day’s fastest car, a fact verified later even by race winner Carl Edwards. A rare foulup in the pits – Stewart’s car drug an air hose outside his pit box after a stop – cost him a painful penalty, however, and pit strategy the rest of the way left Edwards in front of him at the finish.

It was a tough result for Stewart, who, despite scoring eight top 10s in 13 races at Vegas, is still looking for his first victory at the track.

Although he avoided one of the classic meltdowns that have pockmarked his career, Stewart was not in a mood to celebrate his first top-five finish of the season. He informed his crew over the team radio in no uncertain terms that the problem would be fixed, and he squirmed his way through post-race interviews about the day.

Upon further review, however, and with some space between the Vegas disappointment and present reality, Stewart can look at the start of the 2011 season with some vibrant optimism. In fact, in a winter that has seen some of the sport’s stars stumble out of the gate, Stewart is sitting pretty – tied for first in points as he pursues a third Sprint Cup championship.

It seems like ancient history in the Jimmie Johnson Era, but Stewart was the last driver to win a Cup title prior to Johnson’s five-year run.

Although Stewart never led in the season-opening Daytona 500, he was among the group of drivers in position to win the race in the closing laps. He finished 13th after he and drafting partner Mark Martin saw their partnership break apart in traffic in the final miles.

At Phoenix, Stewart came home seventh after leading 59 laps.

Both the Daytona and Phoenix races were muddled by major accidents that mangled cars, but Stewart was among the points survivors in both events. Despite the Vegas bummer, it’s clearly a strong seasonal start, although Stewart said that sparkle was difficult to see.

“I probably should, but that's not in my makeup,” he said. “I mean, it kills me to throw a race away like that, especially at a place we haven’t won at yet. When you lead that many laps and have a car that’s that fast and you lose it, you – I'm sure … when the emotion dies down, we’ll look back and say it was a great weekend, but, man, it does not sit good right now.”

Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEED.com and has been covering motorsports for 29 years. He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.
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