Tag: Stewart

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All Stars Shine Brightly

2009 Daytona 500 085

(Photo by Leon Hammack)

 

It was only a matter of time before THE SMOKER  took his new team to victory lane!  To all the nay sayers, the Stewart-Haas Racing #14 Office Depot/Old Spice Chevy is a true serious threat for the championship for 2009.  In just 12 races the #14 Office Depot/Old Spice Chevy has, no doubt, exceeded the team’s expectations for 2009.  Darien Grubb, THE SMOKER’S  crew chief,  was quoted on NASCAR Now this afternoon, that even though he admitted that the team’s performance for 2009 has been exceeded, the goals for the remainder of this season has and will continuously be adjusted.

The #14 team has climbed up to second position in the Cup standings for 2009.  Not only has the #14 Office Depot/Old Spice Chevy performed outstandingly, but the #39 Army Chevy has quitely maximized their performance and slipped into 8th place in the standings!  With one-third of the season under our belts, both of the Stewart-Haas Racing teams have responded quite well to the challenges of competing at the highest levels of NASCAR.

Since both teams at Stewart-Haas Racing  are positioned strongly in the top 12 securing, at least for the time being, a possible bid in the Chase for the Championship.   Might this lead to the idea that next year might be a very opportune time to add a third race team??  After all, THE SMOKER  just won a million dollars and that now bolsters the bank account very nicely!

COMMENTARY

Is it just me or has Mr. Tony Stewart toned down his criticisms, sharp tongue, and his never ending whining and finger pointing?  Is it the fact that he now is personally responsibile to all of his sponsors that may have caused Tony to “mask his strips”??   Have you noticed that he has started wearing a hat with his sponsor’s logo?  He NEVER did that when he was driving for Joe Gibbs Racing!  What do you think? 

Please take part in the poll below.  Also express your thoughts, via the comment tab at the bottom of this article, on Stewart-Haas Racing starting a third race team, or Tony’s new found personality!

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The Right Stuff!!

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THIS WEEK’S STORY LINES

1.   JIMMIE JOHNSON WINS THIRD CHASE IN A ROW:

2.   CARL EDWARDS WINS AT HOMESTEAD:

3.   DEI-GANASSI NAMED EARNHARDT-GANASSI RACING:

4.   EARNHARADT-GANASSI RACING RUNS CHEVYS IN ’09: (espn)

5.   STEWART MOVES OVER TO STEWART-HAAS RACING:

6.   CREW CHIEFS NAMED FOR STEWART-HAAS RACING: (TSC/SHR PR)

7.   NASCAR BANS ALL TESTING IN 2009: (winstonsalemjournal)

8.   CALE YARBOROUGH ABSENT FROM HOMESTEAD: (orlando sentinal)

 

The 2008 NASCAR racing season has come to close.  The running of the Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Raceway has ended with excitement and a place in the record books of NASCAR.  The winner of the race, Carl Edwards, won it in a dominating fashion, however that was only one half of the story.  Edwards attained his ninth win of the season, the most of any driver this year.  He also led the most laps enroute to the win.  Unfortunately, “Cousin Carl” couldn’t overcome the 141 point disadvantage in this last race.  He did, however cut a significant amount of points off from Jimmie Jonhson’s lead!  Edward’s surge over the last four races was short of a miracle in the NASCAR ranks!!

 

The real story of the weekend was Jimmie Johson’s third consecutive championship!.  That feat had only been accompolished once in NASCAR’s 60 year history.  Johnson got himself in the history books along side Cale Yarborough as the only other driver to score three championships in a row.  The consecutive championships won by these two individuals were exactly 30 years apart!!

 

COMMENTARY

At last, you say, I can finally figure out the title, the picture, and their relationship to NASCAR!!  Well let me tie them together anyway for you.   A few years ago Tom Wolfe wrote a book titled “The Right Stuff”.  It was a book chronicaling the beginnings of supersonic flight in the 1940’s and 1950’s, the brave adventerous pioneering pilots involved, and the teamwork that it took to overcome the dauting tasks that was before them.  There were heros, rivalries, brilliant people, and hard partiers, but the common theme was TEAMWORK!!  Everyone would sacrifice whatever it took to accompolish the goals given them.  You might remember or recognize some of those men, Chuck Yeager, Scott Crossfield, Bob Hoover, Neil Armstrong, John Glen, Buzz Aldrin, Deke Slayton, and James Lovell just to mention a few names.  They all hold their place in aviation history.

 

Racing has its men that have “The Right Stuff” also.  Try on a few of these names on for size, Lee Petty, Richard Petty, Fireball Roberts, David Pearson, Cale Yarborough, Marvin Paunch, Buddy Baker, Benny Parsons, Bobby Allison, Ned Jarrett, Darrell Waltrip, and last but not forgotten Dale Earnhardt, Sr (in the staute above).  These men were just some of the brave pioneers of NASCAR.  They, too, were heros, rivals, hard partiers, and yes they were brilliant in their own way!  They were focused on accompolishing the dauting tasks of winning races and being better than their competitors day in and day out!  They realized that it took TEAMWORK to succeed!!! 

 

 Well add one more name to the history books.  What Jimmie Johnson and the #48 Lowes HMS Chevy accompolished in the last three years has cemented their place in the NASCAR history books!!  That whole team sacrificed everything to be the best when the going got tough!!  Winning three consecutive championships put them in the same sentence as Cale Yarborough.  Until Sunday there was only one driver and team that could lay claim to three championships in a row. 

MOVE OVER CALE, HERE COMES JIMMIE!!!