Tag Archive | 14

Is Nascar A Sport? Are Nascar Drivers Athletes?

The Questions That Simply Won’t Go Away
By Springwolf – Updated 03/2021

It’s a continual question from those who don’t know racing and don’t take the time to learn. Is NASCAR really a sport? Are Race Car Drivers Athletes? Of course the answer to both is YES! But that doesn’t stop the annual questions from critics who have no idea what they’re talking about in the first place.

Anthony Wayne Stewart
3-Time NASCAR Cup Champion

Every year some ‘sports writer’ or newspaper columnist voices the question and then attempts to answer it by saying NASCAR is just a southern activity attended by beer drinking rednecks. They profess to know more than the millions of fans who watch their favorite driver, team and races by claiming that NASCAR isn’t a sport and the drivers aren’t athletes. “All they do is make left turns and waste gas” is their typical line.

Sadly their rhetoric is voiced by the millions of people who don’t have a clue what racing is about. Add to that the age of Twitter and Facebook which gives a platform to people to degrade and put down anyone who does see things the way they do.

After a while it does get annoying and fans of NASCAR sometimes feel the need or desire to respond to these questions. We all know it falls on deaf ears and rarely makes a difference. But many of us love our sport and want to defend it against those that simply use stereotypical put-downs to degrade something they don’t understand. Continue reading →

How NASCAR Fans Watch Baseball

Nov3

2016 World Series – Game 7
Last night, like a lot of people, I watched the final game of the World Series with the Chicago Cubs and the Cleveland Indians. And also like a lot of people, I watched it while following my normal Twitter feed. Now for me, that means I watched a Major League Baseball game with a bunch of NASCAR fans, tweeting about baseball. Talk about some funny tweets.

But it wasn’t until the final 10th inning when I realized these two sports are more a like than they are different. That’s when the Chicago Cubs brought in their pitcher Carl Edwards Jr. You see, in NASCAR we have a Carl Edwards too. And he is also in the final playoff races to the NASCAR Championship. And that got me thinking about how a NASCAR fan would call the game on Twitter.

Baseball From A NASCAR Tweeter:
The baseball Tweets are provided courtesy of The Wall Street Journal – World Series Game 7: Live Updates. Continue reading →

I Cracked Myself Up

Aug5

If You Can’t Laugh At Your Own Humor

You’re missing out on a lot of silly, funny, seriously ridiculous things!

More About Tony, NASCAR and Racing

NASCAR & Racing ~ My Racing Musings (with more on Tony)

What Smoke Means To Race Fans

Jul25

Tony Stewart 2016.07.24 at Indy

Tony Stewart Tributes

This past Sunday, 3-Time Sprint Cup Champion Tony Stewart ran his last race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS). It was an emotional weekend for sure. Not only for Tony, but for his family, friends and fans too.

Tony was born in Columbus Indiana and IMS is his home track. He’s also the only active Cup driver born in Indiana who still lives in Indiana on a regular basis. He’s a beloved native son and no one has said how much he’s respected and appreciated in Indiana than Robert Riddle’s article “Logging Laps: The Final Lap“.

As a Stewart fan, I always want more stories like this about the good things Tony does for the Racing communities around the world. I think those things he does that some how sneak out through other sources show the kind of man he really is.

Like the 2013 Kyle Larson Daytona Crash into the fence where several fans were hurt and taken to the hospital. Tony won that race. The first thing we saw him do was ask about the fans. Then he kept his winning celebration very low-key out of respect for those who were hurt. It wasn’t until months later we found out Tony went to the hospital and visited with every fan who was injured. And it wasn’t an in and out, I’m sorry you were hurt. He sat with everyone for as long as they welcomed him. That’s class. Continue reading →

Indy Reveals Dirt Track For Tony

Jul5

Indianapolis Motor Speedway Builds Tony Stewart A 3/16th-mile Dirt Track
July 5th, 2016

IMSDirtTrackReveal

In honor of NASCARs 3-Time Sprint Cup Champion Tony Stewart in this last and final season of his Cup career the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, his home track built the People’s Champ a dirt track.

The track made the announcement at the end of last month Indy Builds Tony Stewart A 3/16th-mile Dirt Track on Twitter. Today was the big reveal for Tony and his USAC friends. Bryan Clauson, Sarah Fisher, Keith Kuntz and several others attended today’s exhibition. Continue reading →

NASCAR – Tony Stewart Breaks Winless Streak

Jun29

3-Time Sprint Cup Champion Tony Stewart – Wins at Sonoma

Sonoma California
June 26, 2016

Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 will become a favorite for many race fans regardless of series or generation. Tony Stewart breaks his 84 race winless streak with a win at Sonoma. Marking his 49th Career win!

Also known as “Smoke”, Tony won at least 1 race each season from the start of his career until 2013. The dry spell of 2014 and 2015 came after several tragedies and emotional comebacks in Tony’s life. He missed the first 8 races of the 2016 season after suffering a broken back in an all-terrain vehicle accident a couple of weeks before his final season was to begin in February at the Daytona 500. A race he was never able to win in his Cup career.

His father, Nelson Stewart, was still wiping away tears while watching his only son celebrate in Victory Lane. “It’s been a tough three years not just for him but everyone that’s close to him,” his father said. “I don’t know what to say. We all needed that bad. He really needed that bad.”

Since 2013 the specifications for Nascar set-ups have changed many times. Tony said many times that these set-ups didn’t mesh with his style of driving and he was struggling to find the right way to drive them from his perspective. But over the past few weeks, Tony and his Crew Chief Michael Bugarewicz have been improving the set up to fit Smoke’s style. Continue reading →

NASCAR – Fireworks War At Hidden Hollow

Jun29

It’s war!

Celebrating The Win At Sonoma
June 28, 2016

Tony begins his Periscope shares and then hands his phone off. Our PR rep for the evening is Megan Droud, Rico Abreu’s girlfriend. She explains who our teams are for the evening.

The young guns driver Rico Abreu, his crew guy Trevor and Tanner Thorson his teammate from Keith Kunz Motorsports.
The old guys Tony, Keith Kunz and crew guy Big Al.

On June 26, 2016 Tony Stewart won at Sonoma, California. It’s his first win of the season and comes after an 84 race dry spell. It was a popular win among a variety of fans, other drivers, crews and even folks from other racing series. After his media obligations at the track, Tony went to his Hidden Hollow Home in Indiana. On Monday, Rico Abreu tweeted about having lunch with Smoke and some of their friends. Continue reading →

NASCAR – Indy Builds DirtTrack For Tony

Jun28

Indianapolis Motor Speedway Builds Tony Stewart A 3/16th-mile Dirt Track
June 28, 2016

Tracks all over the country are planning special events to honor 3-Time Sprint Cup Champion Tony Stewart in this last and final season of his NASCAR career. No one is giving him a bigger going away present than Indianapolis Motor Speedway, his home track and one of his top favorite tracks.

The track made the announcement today on their Twitter account:
Indy Motor Speedway (@IMS)
June 28, 2016
A short track at IMS in honor of @TonyStewart? You heard right. The dirt arrives tomorrow! Continue reading →

3-Time NASCAR Champ Inducted into the USAC Hall Of Fame

Jun17

2016 USAC Hall Of Fame Inductees Announced

On June 20 the United States Auto Club (USAC) announced their Hall of Fame Inductees. The class of 8 five drivers, two officials and a car owner-chief mechanic. Alphabetically Russ Clendenen, Jimmy Davies, Bob Higman, Tommy Hinnershitz, Dick King, Pat O’Connor, Tony Stewart and Bob Tattersall.

It’s that 3-Time NASCAR Champion Tony Stewart that caught my attention. USAC’s announcement profiles each of their inductees. All 8 have overcome challenges, persevered through trials, set backs and hardships. And all of them have lived their dream and triumphed.

Tony Stewart, of Columbus, Ind., became the first driver ever to claim all three of USAC’s National championships in a single season (in 1995) and is one of only six USAC “Triple Crown Champions.” He won the 1994 USAC National Midget title, then added the Midget, Sprint and Silver Crown honors the next season. Proficient in virtually every form of motorsports, he has earned three NASCAR Cup championships (2002, 2005 and 2011) and a 1997 Indy Racing League title. He has 27 USAC National Midget wins to his credit, as well as 10 wins in the Sprint cars and three in the Silver Crown series. A member of the National Midget Hall of Fame (2001), his list of impressive motorsports awards and accolades continues to grow. In five Indianapolis 500 appearances, he started first in 1996, finished fifth from the front row in 1997, was ninth in 1999 and sixth in 2001. His charitable contributions through his Tony Stewart Foundation are endless. In addition to his USAC driving titles, he also has seven Sprint Car Owner championships as well as seven in the Silver Crown Series as an owner.

Tony also owns Tony Stewart Racing a title-winning World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series team.

He’s also part owner in Stewart-Haas Racing. Another title-winning NASCAR Sprint Cup Series team co-owned with Gene Haas, founder of Haas Automation – the largest CNC machine tool builder in North America.

Online voting for the final four 2016 inductees into the USAC Hall of Fame will be available on the USAC website Monday (June 20) at www.usacracing.com.

More About Tony, NASCAR and Racing

NASCAR & Racing ~ My Racing Musings (with more on Tony)

My Favorite Tony Stewart Autograph

May15

Anthony Fox

In 2012 my son and I went to Build-A-Bear and picked up a couple of new friends. The Fennec Fox is the smallest fox in the world and is easy to recognize by its very large ears. It was his ears that attracted me to this little guy at Build-A-Bear. At the time, the shop was donating part of the proceeds from the Fennec Fox to the World Wildlife Federation to help animals. So when it came time to give him a name, Anthony Fox just seemed like the perfect name in honor of my favorite NASCAR driver Tony “Smoke” Stewart.

Tony is a philanthropist who focuses on funding organizations serving children who are critically ill or physically disabled; animals at risk or endangers and drivers injured in the sport of motor racing through The Tony Stewart Foundation.

A few years earlier, a friend sent me a promo picture of Tony in a very dapper 3-piece suit. It’s one of my favorite Smoke pictures. And that picture inspired the attire for my new friend Anthony Fox.

Each year NASCAR comes to the Richmond International Raceway for a spring race. Last year in 2015, Tony was available for an autograph session at the shop. So of course I had to take Anthony to be signed. I asked Tony if he remembered the promo picture. He giggled and said yes. So I told him that picture inspired my ‘bear’ that we named “Anthony Fox”. Tony giggled and signed his vest “To Anthony Fox, Tony Stewart”. It is my MOST favorite Tony autograph ever!

Anthony Fox and 3-Time NASCAR Champion Tony Stewart

Today on Tony’s Facebook page, I shared my favorite autograph story and someone asked for a picture. You can’t post pictures to Smoke’s page, so I decided this was a good time to share our 1st meeting with Tony here in Richmond. It was exciting and Smoke was very nice too!

More About Tony, NASCAR and Racing

NASCAR & Racing ~ My Racing Musings (with more on Tony)