Before the race for the NASCAR Spring Cup Series championship began critics were showing their true colors and bias towards Tony Stewart. Whether or not the commentators have their personal issues with the two time champ is another issue. Most of them had written Tony off of the championship before he took charge and won the first championship race at Chicago.
Stewart moved up to second place in points after winning in Chicago and then backed up his incredible run with another win at Louden, NH. This placed Stewart in the top spot in points. People still doubted Stewart and his chances to become a champ for the third time. After two mediocre races following Louden, the critics were jumping all over Stewart and saying that he had no chance.
Skip forward to the paper clip track at Martinsville where Tony had awful finishes the last few visits there. Going into this race, Stewart was going to use the setup from the 39 team. Ryan Newman had run better at this short track than Stewart recently, so Stewart decided to practice with Newman’s setup. After 300 laps of the 500, Stewart and crew chief Grubb finally hit the right set up and was able to take off towards the front.
After a late race caution, Tony was sitting in great shape with fresher tires than some of the leaders which included Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Kevin Harvick. With three laps to go, Tony was restarting on the outside which is a typically terrible place to restart. Tony charged his way around Jimmie Johnson and was able to hold him off for his third win of the year and his third win at Martinsville. Stewart is now only 8 points behind Carl Edwards and is looking forward to the next races that have been very good for him.
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