So far, Sprint Cup ownership has been like a week at the beach for Tony Stewart.
“We’ve had three awesome days in a row,” said Stewart, who joined Bill Elliott and Travis Kvapil as drivers to lock themselves into the Daytona 500 field based on qualifying speed Sunday at Daytona International Speedway.
Stewart, third in Saturday night’s Budweiser Shootout, couldn’t be much happier with the way his team has performed. His new teammate, defending Daytona 500 champ Ryan Newman, was third fastest in qualifying. Stewart’s Chevrolet was 10th fastest.
“I hope it’s not something that’s a dream,” said Stewart, 37, a two-time Cup series champion who has yet to win a Daytona 500. “But it’s hard to have three days like we’ve had in a row and (not believe we) have it right.
“When we saw Ryan go up there and sit on the outside of the front row (at 187.778 mph) for as long as he did, it obviously told us we had a shot at the pole. We had just a really small harmonic vibration that didn’t help us, for sure. I’m still proud to look up and see two cars in the top 10 and know this has all happened in such a small amount of time.”
“I think ultimately in a big situation like this, you don’t want to expect too much because you set yourself up for disappointment,” Newman said. “I can’t speak on behalf of Tony for his expectations but I’m really proud of the way the team’s come off the truck and the way the team’s working together.”
This is the first time the full team has been on a race track during a race weekend. Stewart also was impressed with the team’s fluidity.
“As odd as it’s going to sound, it almost seemed like we worked together before,” Stewart said. “I was really surprised in the confidence I heard from [crew chief Darian Grubb] every time the caution came out about what we were going to do, how much of a change we were going to make.”
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