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Big One for Stewart

2-time champ snaps 43-race winless streak

John Bazemore / Associated Press

Tony Stewart reacts in Victory Lane after winning the Sprint Cup Series’ AMP Energy 500 at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday.

By Mike Mulhern | Journal Reporter

Published: October 6, 2008

TALLADEGA, Ala. - Tony Stewart finally got that first Talladega victory, and it came on a wild and crazy Sunday afternoon, filled with exploding tires, bad crashes and a controversial finish.
After a late-race crash eliminated most of the day's front-runners, Stewart appeared to have the rest of the field well in command. However, he wound up barely holding on to beat a trio of Dale Earnhardt Inc. drivers to win the Amp Energy 500, and then needed a post-race decision by NASCAR officials to uphold the win against rookie Regan Smith.
NASCAR officials and Goodyear engineers took it on the chin again, when yet another rash of major tire issues led to numerous crashes during the race and sent championship challenger Denny Hamlin to the hospital.
Then a dramatic late-race crash may well have made this turning point of the title chase. This race certainly lived up to its wild card reputation, when a major 12-car crash took out NASCAR championship contenders Carl Edwards, Greg Biffle, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Matt Kenseth, Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch. Edwards took the blame.
Jimmie Johnson has a solid, if not comfortable, 70-plus point lead against his closest challengers — Edwards and Biffle.
Dale Earnhardt Jr., who wound up a crashed-out 28th and is 249 points behind Johnson, said the exploding tires were frightening: "To be honest with you, that wasn't no fun. The tires were blowing. Everybody was scared about the tires blowing.
"Anybody can pass, no skill involved. We are going to tear up a lot of race cars with this the way it is.
"The tires were worrying me. I was scared to death I was going to blow a right-front tire again. Denny — I ain't never seen a car hit the wall that hard.
"We just kept seeing tires blow.
"I was hoping NASCAR would say something to make us all feel better because we was getting all nervous out there."
On the restart with 11 laps to go, Stewart was leading Joe Nemechek and Elliott Sadler and David Ragan. However at that point there were about 14 men still with a legitimate shot at the win, and the DEI three charged into contention.
That Stewart's biggest challengers were the DEI trio of Smith, Paul Menard and Aric Almirola belies the doom-and-gloom scenarios surrounding DEI.
Menard, who wound up getting a career-best second after NASCAR penalized Smith to 18th for his last-lap below-the-yellow-line pass, pointed to the addition of Bobby Hutchens six weeks ago for leading the surprising turnaround in DEI's fortunes.
However the changes at DEI came too late for Menard, who is moving to the Doug Yates-Jack Roush Ford camp at the end of the season.
A final caution for Jamie McMurray's spin set up a three lap shootout. Coming to the checkered flag, near the first turn, at the end of the long frontstretch, Smith made a move high then low, and when Stewart blocked him to the low side, Smith kept going, passing him below the yellow line that marks out-of-bounds.
That a driver is not allowed to gain track position at Daytona or Talladega by passing below the yellow line is well known.
However Smith, Menard and two-time NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson all insisted on the last lap NASCAR had a policy that did indeed allow such a move, and all three questioned NASCAR's call.
Nevertheless NASCAR disallowed Smith's pass and penalized him.
"I got a nose down in there, and then got forced down there, and we're told in the driver's meeting that if you're forced down below the line it's OK, and he forced me down there," Smith said. "I should be out there doing burnouts."
NASCAR officials didn't agree.
NASCAR's Jim Hunter, vice president of corporate communications, released a statement late yesterday:
"You cannot improve your position any time you go below the yellow line.
"In our judgment he (Smith) improved his position, and the penalty for that is a pass-through (down pit road).
"So he was moved to the tail end of the longest line, or 18th.
"At the driver's meeting we clearly state that you cannot improve your position by going below the yellow line.
"Any time you get into a situation like this, there are going to be two different opinions. We respect Regan's view. But we made the call, we think it is the right call, and the finish is final.
"NASCAR has to maintain some kind of control, and that's the reason we say you cannot advance your position by going below the yellow line. If he had not improved his position, he probably would have been awarded second place."
Menard called Smith's pass legitimate: "We've seen last-lap passes like that for the win before, so I thought that call was a little odd."
Johnson, who finished ninth and padded his Sprint Cup points lead heading to Concord, said he too thought Smith's pass might have been legal, and he said that tactic had been talked among drivers all yesterday morning before the race, following a similar situation in Saturday's Truck race. "I would have made the same move as Regan made," Johnson said.
How ironic then that so many NASCAR drivers were so unsure about the last lap rules at such an important event.
Nevertheless NASCAR gave the win to Stewart, whose last tour win was more than a year ago.
And Stewart — who had been the very first man penalized for passing below the yellow line, in a Daytona race six years ago — said he had no questions about the rule.
"To do it at Talladega … I've wanted to win here for so long," Stewart said emotionally of his first Talladega victory. "I know some fans here haven't been too happy about me, but there are a lot of orange shirts up there in the stands, and this is for them.
"I knew with three DEI cars behind me it would be tough. I just had to try to protect at the end."
Johnson, on Smith's pass: "From what I understand, it's a judgment call. From what I understand before the race started, if you have the flagman in sight (on the last lap), you are able to go below the yellow line. And I think that is an arguable point.
"If I were Regan I'd be arguing the hell out of it now. But if I was told I'd say 'no way'.
"I'm sure there is going to a lot of discussion about this one this week."
And Johnson said he certainly wanted it cleared up: "If there is a yellow line rule, there is a yellow line rule period. We can have one hell of a mess and hurt some people with guys trying to get down on the apron.
"Thankfully Regan did a good job of hanging on to it. But you could see the car was not comfortable down there.
"But I learned before the race started that there was this deal where if you could see the flagman, it was a free-for-all. The drivers were talking about it before the race. Regan heard it as well, because he went down there to try and win the race.
"I think it came out of the Saturday Truck race — I think Phil Parsons made a comment about coming to the checkered if you can see the flagman you can go below the yellow line."