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Stewart is a throwback to the days of Junior Johnson, Richard Petty, AJ Foyt, and Dale Earnhardt. He is a racer’s racer, a pure racer, a man that will hop into anything that runs and go all out for glory. Stewart is not your corporate cookie cutter type in the mold of today’s drivers such as Jimmy Johnson and Jeff Gordon. Sure, Johnson and Gordon are champions and certain future Hall of Fame drivers but neither can match the “in his bones” and soul love of racing that Stewart possesses. In fact, everyone in NASCAR betting knows that Stewart is possessed by racing.

Stewart has raced every type of vehicle imaginable and was a champion on the Indy Car circuit before signing up with Joe Gibbs racing to run in NASCAR, where he became a fulltime driver in 2000. Stewart quickly captured the imagination of fans for his explosive temper which came to the forefront in 2001 when he deliberately slammed into Jeff Gordon at the Bristol race that spring due to what he felt was dirty driving.

Since that time Stewart has had numerous run-ins with the NASCAR brass, other drivers, writers, commentators, and camera men. NASCAR even forced him to attend anger management training a few years ago. But none of that in the end has mattered to Stewart fans, who love his intensity and passion for greatness.

This year Stewart emerged from the background as Carl Edwards was closing in on the Sprint Cup title for 2011. But Stewart drove a fantastic race at Homestead, FL in the NASCAR season finale to steal the title from Edwards and take his 3rd championship in the series. Stewart finished this season with five wins and a total of 19 top 10 finishes as a model of excellence and consistency.

Stewart furthers his throwback credentials as his own team owner, just exactly like Petty did in his heyday when he dominated the sport for a generation, which is what Stewart aims to do for years to come.

Leave it to Ryan Newma to cut to the core of the issue.

Always quick to remind everyone that he earned an engineering degree (Vehicle Structure Engineering, to be precise) from Purdue University, Newman sometimes has a way of talking down to questioners. He just can’t help himself, forgetting that said questioners wouldn’t be asking him questions in the first place if they knew as much as he did.

But on the topic of what’s happening at Daytona International Speedway right now, there really is no better source and there were no wiser words spoken by anyone else in the aftermath of last Saturday night’s Bud Shootout victory for Kurt Busch. Working almost exclusively in two-car drafts much of the night — as expected — but for much longer stretches and at much higher speeds than anyone anticipated, Busch’s No. 22 Dodge edged Newman’s No. 39 Chevrolet and others at the finish line in the non-points event that officially kicked off the 2011 Sprint Cup season.

For safety reasons, and also because going faster could affect insurance policies some tracks have in place, NASCAR has long strived to keep top speeds below 200 miles per hour. Last Saturday night at Daytona, however, cars were clocked going as fast as 206 mph.

That raised a legitimate question that is in discussion even in BetUS online betting. How fast is too fast?

Newman was ready with a legitimate answer.

“One ninety-five [mph] versus 206.5, I don’t know that you could feel it,” he said. “But I’ve always said the most important thing is we keep the race cars on the race track. So whatever we’ve worked on with our liftoff speed, if the car is going backwards, sideways, whatever else to keep the cars down, that’s what NASCAR needs to focus on for making the race safe.

“If the cars get airborne at 140, we’d better not cross 139 — so I don’t know what that number is. I don’t know if there is a true number out there, but if we were doing 212 and the cars were safe and we could keep them on the ground, then that’s fine with me.”

 NASCAR’s response

It didn’t take NASCAR long to respond to Saturday’s high-speed action. They mandated subtle technical changes to the cars on Sunday that most of us neither fully understand nor care about.

Full Story Nascar.com

“Obviously, it gives you good ideas that you have a great car,” Earnhardt Jr. said of his pole-winning run. “Anybody can win the race. I mean there are guys that qualified outside the top-20 that have winning cars, so it is going to be a tough race to win.” Full Story

It was the best season possible for HMS’ No. 48 team and its driver, Jimmie Johnson. After all, Johnson claimed an unprecedented fifth-straight Sprint Cup. The No. 48 team claimed all six of Hendrick Motorsports’ wins in 2010 and also posted 17 top-fives and 23 top-10 finishes. More

With the Chase approaching, drivers have differing goals in mind for the eight races remaining in what has come to be known as the Race to the Chase — races 17 through 26 on the schedule — the final 10 races prior to the Chase cutoff coming up following the Sept. 11 event at Richmond International Raceway. Full Story