Stewart steals the spotlight once again
FORT WORTH, Texas – Tony Stewart’s eyes lit up at the thought.
Winning out in the last four races of NASCAR’s Chase for the Nextel Cup championship is a goal he can get his arms around – especially because he isn’t part of the stock car playoff party.
While the tense battles of the Chase rage on, Stewart is driving in a world of his own.
It just so happens that Stewart’s world is way out in front of all the drama.
Having fun and driving for wins – not a championship – Stewart overpowered the field in the Dickies 500, and he made this one look almost too easy: “Smoke” led 278 of 339 laps, including the five extra laps because of a late caution, and often was so far ahead that he appeared to be all by himself on the track.
Most of the action was well behind him, where Jimmie Johnson quietly grabbed away the point lead from Matt Kenseth by 17 points with a second-place finish. Stewart easily raced away to his fifth win of the season and third in the eight Chase races.
The race tightened up the championship, with Johnson, Kenseth, Dale Earnhardt Jr., rookie Denny Hamlin and Kevin Harvick separated by just 105 points with two races remaining. All of them finished among the top 12 Sunday.
Harvick finished third, followed by Kyle Busch, rookie Clint Bowyer and Earnhardt.
Kenseth started 36th, the worst of any of the contenders, struggled with handling throughout the early part of the race and overcame a speeding penalty. At one point, the 2003 champion thought he had a tire going down and almost pitted under green. But he stayed out and somehow finished 12th.
Hamlin was never in contention but hung on for a 10th-place finish that dropped him from third to fourth, 80 points behind the leader.
Jeff Burton, who began the day tied with Earnhardt for fourth, just 84 points behind Kenseth, saw his championship hopes destroyed when a tire blew on lap 89, sending him hard into the wall and relegating him to a 38th-place finish and seventh place in the standings, 184 points out of first.
Kasey Kahne, who won the spring race at Texas and leads the Cup series with six victories this year, was the only driver able to even challenge Stewart on Sunday. He was right behind on a restart on lap 262 and made a couple of tries to get by the leader. But Stewart wasn’t having any of it and slowly pulled away.
Mark Martin, who started the day 201 points out, never got into contention after having to go to a backup car following a crash in Saturday’s practice. He finished 22nd and fell 253 points behind Johnson.
Two-time champion Terry Labonte ended his 29-year, 848-race driving career with a 36th-place finish after being feted Sunday before the race.