Donny Schatz on his way to victory in the Valvoline Australian Sprintcar Grand Prix. (Photo: parramattacityraceway.com.au)

Stewart came to grips with the challenging track surface during the feature race to steadily move forward before finding his way to seventh place in at the finish in one his rare appearances behind the wheel of an 800-plus horsepower Sprintcar.

"I think to finish seventh from the tail was ok, it was a good first night for me, obviously not as good as my team-mate who won the race but he runs 100 races a year and I get to run three,” said Stewart.

"I don't know how many days it is until we run again but I can't wait for it.

"I'm a little tired tonight, it is a set of muscles that I don't use very much but I had a blast.

“The rain really hurt the racetrack, it was hard, with the rain that we got over the last couple of days it was bound to make the track a little messy but I think everybody did a pretty good job considering the conditions.”

Schatz’s fellow American Tim Shaffer raced his way to third place ahead of local trio Grant Tunks, James Thompson and Adrian Maher.