Tony Stewart discusses his transition from driver to owner, SHR's ups and downs
By Bob Pockrass
FOX Sports NASCAR Reporter
Tony Stewart has more than enough racing experience to know that there will be some bad seasons among the great ones.
He knows everyone has seasons when the cars just aren’t as fast as the competition and things can’t change dramatically over a couple of weeks.
So does that make this season at Stewart-Haas Racing any easier to take?
"No," Stewart said with a small laugh. "It always sucks. Everything comes in waves and cycles. … It doesn’t make you feel any better knowing you’re in a wave like that.
"We’re all competitive and we all want to be on top of our game all the time. The ones that are complacent and are OK knowing that it is just a wave, those are the teams that we’ll kick their a-- every week."
The co-owner obviously would love to see more kicking butts than he has seen this year out of his organization. Aric Almirola should make the playoffs thanks to his win last month at New Hampshire Motor Speedway but right now is the lowest among the 2021 winners in the standings at 23rd.
Kevin Harvick sits 10th in the standings and hopes that if he doesn’t win, that he can get into the playoffs on points. Chase Briscoe (24th) and Cole Custer (28th) face must-win situations over the next four events to make the playoffs.
Last year, all four of the SHR drivers (Harvick, Almirola, Custer and Clint Bowyer) qualified for the playoffs.
Stewart tries to help, but he can only do so much.
"There’s nothing that I’m going to tell Zipadelli that is going to help anything," Stewart said about his conversations with competition director Greg Zipadelli. "All he can do is fill me in on what we’re fighting and the frustrations behind it."
And Stewart is well aware that his last race in a Cup car came in 2016, so he knows even his suggestions to drivers can only carry so much weight.
"To try to coach them through it or cheerlead them through it, it’s literally just a cheerleading role," he said. "I can understand what they tell me … and listen to their comments and somewhat understand what they’re talking about feel-wise.
"But I haven’t been in a [NASCAR] car for five years, so I’m not feeling what they’re feeling, and don’t know 100 percent what their feel is."
But Stewart knows one area where he certainly can contribute as a co-owner. He still is the most famous person at SHR, and he plays a key role in keeping sponsors happy.
This interview was arranged as part of a promotional blitz for SHR sponsor Go Bowling’s contest where fans can sign up on the Go Bowling website for a chance to bowl against Stewart, who has a couple of bowling lanes in his home.
The three-time Cup champion knows he has to provide sponsor value off the track.
"All the partners aren’t able to activate at the tracks like they used to," Stewart said. "It’s starting to get there but it’s still not all the way there yet. … It’s just part of the big picture and making sure that we take care of these people."
On the track, Stewart knows that part of SHR’s issues this year have come from NASCAR changing the way it inspects the measurements of the body that surrounds the wheel area. While all teams were working in that area to improve downforce, it appears SHR was more advanced than the rest and the change hurt them the most.
Stewart says he won’t blame NASCAR for its change in templates and also trying to make rules to keep teams sustained economically amid the hits of the pandemic the last couple of years.
"Rules packages that are locked in, parts that are locked in on both the chassis side with the teams and parts in the motors in an effort to save the teams money to put towards next year’s cars, … We’ve just got to take what we’ve got and do a better job with it now," Stewart said.
As far as Almirola’s win at New Hampshire, Stewart isn’t sure what it means for the rest of the year.
"I’m not sure if there was anything in particular necessarily that was there – they just hit the setup that day," Stewart said. "The hard part with no practice, it is a roll of the dice to try to get that. Hopefully, that was something we can use for all four cars on the flatter tracks. … Those are places that we have really struggled."
One thing that helps is that while his drivers have struggled, there isn’t too much chatter about changes to the driver lineup for 2022 as long as sponsors return. Smithfield (Almirola’s long-time primary sponsor) is one that needs to re-sign.
"Trust me, the lack of performance isn’t because of drivers right now," Stewart said. "I don’t think there are any of the four guys that feel like they have to worry about anything for next year from that standpoint. Everybody is realistic in understanding what the situation and scenario is. It’s just a matter of fighting through it."
Stewart hasn’t attended many NASCAR races this year. He co-owned – and won as a driver – the six-week all-star Superstar Racing Experience (SRX) series. He also keeps tabs on his sprint-car series (All-Star Circuit of Champions) and race track (Eldora Speedway) in addition to SHR. Plus he has been to several NHRA events with his fiancée, NHRA driver Leah Pruett.
He will be at the Cup race next week at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Last year, he had planned to do the Xfinity Series race at the Indianapolis road course, but those plans were scrapped because of the pandemic and now that the series has raced there, he isn’t sure that he would consider competing in that event in the future.
"The reason I wanted to do it is I was going to be on somewhat of a level playing field as I can be on with those guys – to go to a track that nobody has raced on," Stewart said. "I felt like that gave me at least a shot at being competitive. … But now they’ve got time on it and the circumstances businesswise didn’t make it feasible for me to do that this year."
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What to Watch For
Watkins Glen, like Sonoma, could be hard to predict considering drivers didn’t compete at the track last year and the last time they had a low-downforce package there was in 2018.
Then again, Chase Elliott won both the 2018 and 2019 races at the track, and with him winning two of the four road-course races so far in 2021, he’s obviously someone to watch.
Prior to Elliott winning back-to-back races at the track, Watkins Glen saw a variety of winners: Martin Truex Jr. (2017), Denny Hamlin (2016), Joey Logano (2015), AJ Allmendinger (2014; not entered this year) and Kyle Busch (2013).
Considering the strength of the Joe Gibbs Racing cars last month at Road America, Truex, Hamlin, Busch and Christopher Bell (Daytona road course winner, second at Road America) can’t be overlooked.
Drivers with top-10 finishes in the two most recent road-course races (Sonoma and Road America): Kurt Busch, Elliott, Hamlin, Busch, Truex and Ross Chastain. Oh, and Kyle Larson, who won at Sonoma and should have had a top-five finish at Road America if he had not been taken out (accidentally) by teammate Alex Bowman.
Thinking Out Loud
While NASCAR likes to keep things consistent for its three national series as far as who practices and qualifies, it would have been nice for the Camping World Truck Series drivers to have had a practice this weekend at Watkins Glen.
Granted, there are no more road courses left this year for those drivers, so asking them to prepare a backup truck in case of a wreck in practice could have been a waste of time.
But with NASCAR not having raced trucks at Watkins Glen since 2001, and with this race representing the regular-season finale, the drivers and teams deserved to have one practice to get a feel of the track.
It might not have been the best move financially, but in the competitive spirit and in trying to put on the best show possible, a practice would have allowed everyone to get some track time (and not be dependent on a manufacturer alliance to get on a simulator) as well as to shake down their road-course trucks, which they haven’t used since April in Austin.
Social Spotlight
They Said It
"Having some job security and being able to put a contract in front of [Ross Chastain] that’s a multi-year contract is going to let him exhale a little bit after fighting for his life for 10 years and say, ‘This is my home, and I’m ready to get to work.'" – Trackhouse Racing co-owner Justin Marks
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Bob Pockrass has spent decades covering motorsports, including the past 30 Daytona 500s. He joined FOX Sports in 2019 following stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @bobpockrass.
