Stewart excelling in third act as NHRA Top Fuel driver

BRISTOL, Tenn. — You rarely see "Tony Stewart" and "laid back" in the same sentence, but Stewart enjoyed a laid-back Friday morning at Bristol Dragway in advance of this weekend's Super Grip Thunder Valley Nationals. Stewart rolled into Thunder Valley and had a visit with his dad in his wife Leah Pruett's pit area before making his way over to his team pit where he was met by some fans waiting for autographs. He asked them for 10 minutes to get settled, and they answered with, "No problem." "You'd never get that at a NASCAR race if they were that close to you," Stewart said as he recounted the story later in the day. "They'd be pushing through ropes and everything else to get to you. I think that's what I like about this atmosphere is everybody's a lot more laid back, but I think it's the culture and atmosphere NHRA has created." Indeed, Stewart found himself in the eye of the NASCAR storm from the minute he burst onto the scene as a Cup Series rookie in 1999. The sport was riding a wave of popularity that seemed to have no end thanks in large part to the white-hot rivalry between Dale Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon. The stands were packed and the spotlight burned bright as Stewart gracefully made the transition from a bonafide dirt-track legend and IndyCar champion into a formidable stock car driver. He drove his No. 20 Pontiac to three wins as a rookie and went on to win 49 races and three Cup championships before stepping out of the car at the end of the 2016 season. After Earnhardt's tragic death in 2001, Stewart emerged as a leader in the garage area and a face of the sport. With that came the attention of the sport's passionate fanbase. Stewart may be in the best position to assess what all motorsports have in common since he has raced and won in just about everything with a motor and four wheels. "Whatever form of motorsports they're into, they're diehard and they're all in," Stewart said. Stewart's third act as the pilot of an NHRA Top Fuel dragster has tested the limits of his ability to adapt as a driver. His debut in a Top Fuel dragster came eight years after his career as a full-time NASCAR driver ended, and he has since gone on to win three races. The transition from open-wheel racing to stock car racing has proven to be an insurmountable challenge for those who have tried it. Juan Pablo Montoya, Danica Patrick and Jacques Villeneuve are among the drivers who excelled in open-wheel racing before struggling to run up front in NASCAR. But making the transition to driving an NHRA Top Fuel dragster might be an even greater leap. In open-wheel and stock car racing, Stewart's ability behind the wheel could compensate for a lot. He could take a good car and make it great by leaning into his natural ability and years of experience. Not so in Top Fuel, where crew chiefs and engine tuners live under the constant pressure of needing to hit on the right setup to give their drivers a fighting chance. "When you're used to being 70 percent of the equation, it's a lot difference scenario than what I'm in now," he said. "Every one of us that gets in the car knows we're only going to be able to do what our car lets us do. You can want to be able to use all these tools you've learned over the years, but there's about 5 percent of the tools I know that I actually get to use when I drag race." Still, Stewart's fierce competitiveness and passion for racing is still an important asset, as is the experience he gained running Stewart-Haas Racing in NASCAR as an owner/driver. In his first year driving for Elite Motorsports, Stewart had his finger on the pulse of the team's progress as they worked through preseason testing. When he arrived in Pomona, California, for the Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals, he told team owner Richard Freeman all the tools and people were in place to contend for a championship. Stewart went out and backed that statement up by winning the event that Sunday. "He actually kind of called his shot that weekend," Freeman said. "I don't know how, but we went on to win that race." Elite's seven-car team is a rarity in the NHRA. Freeman has been a major force in the Pro Stock division over the years, and the injection of Top Fuel and Funny Car teams into the equation this season has required cooperation across divisions that have little in common. Given Stewart's history of racing across so many disciplines, the challenge is right up his alley. "To me, that's the coolest thing to watch," Freeman said. "You're watching worlds cross, paths cross that haven't been crossed much, if ever."