Don Coble

Tony Stewart Feature
By Don Coble
Morris News Service

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Even when he's smiling and saying all the right things, nothing comes easy with Tony Stewart. He's stopped fighting with his race team, but he still gives them fits. He's not afraid to kiss his pet monkey on the lips, donate millions to charities, slug a photographer or wear a "No Autographs" T-shirt to a fan club outing.

The racing world has come to expect, if not appreciate, the unexpected from Tony Stewart. Would racing want anything else?

The new and improved Stewart who won the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series championship last year said he finally understands what his race team and fans expect of him, and with that revelation came unwavering support and respect from everyone in the business. He laughs off criticism -- although it probably still festers inside -- and has learned to playfully handle the pressures of his position as the sport's newest standard barrier.

He still doesn't read newspapers or watch television, so he's immune from the things said about him, good and bad. He's too busy playing with his remote-control race cars, or playing online poker, or playing in a pool tournament, or racing his U.S. Auto Club Midget cars, or running his dirt track, or driving a sports car in the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona. There are many toys and distractions waiting for the champion of all stock-car racing, and Stewart is a man who likes to play.

His off-season was so busy, he skipped a mandatory three-day test session for the Daytona 500 so he could get ready for a Midget-car race in Tulsa, Okla. Stewart flipped twice in two nights during heat races and was sent to a local hospital. He left Oklahoma with a sore right arm and cracked ribs, but vowed to be ready for the 24-hour sports car race and Sunday's Daytona 500.

It's the kind of stuff that drives his race team crazy. It also makes them love him even more.

"For him to go back to the local tracks where he started, we think it's all right," said team president J.D. Gibbs. "He enjoys that. It keeps him passionate about racing. His life centers around racing. It's a matter of all of us finding a comfort level (with his schedule). We want him to enjoy what he's doing.

"We told him he's still driving in the Daytona 500 even if his arm was broken."

With Stewart, there are no hidden agendas, no false pretenses. He is a man driven by emotion. When it's in check, he's one of the greatest drivers in American motorsports history. When it's out of control, he's almost unbeatable -- and unbearable.

An intervention with his race team a year ago helped him understand the people closest to him weren't his enemies. He was so stubborn, so angry, they couldn't take it any more.

So crew chief Greg Zipadelli locked them all in a room and told them to work out their problems. If it came to blows, so be it. When Stewart asked them if they wanted him to resign, they circled in support like they'd done a hundred other times and finally made him understand his worst enemy was himself.

Their message was clear: The only person beating Tony Stewart up was Tony Stewart.

Gibbs admitted his team grew tired of Stewart's anger and mood swings. The closed-door meeting was the last resort.

"Are we going to have to deal with this forever?" Gibbs asked. "A real breakout came when we got him in a room with his guys. Those guys didn't hold back. They let him know they were there for him and loved him, but they needed him to work with them as well."

Zipadelli made it simple: "I told Tony to relax," he said.

Tony has been 'terrible' most of his life

Tony Stewart has always been angry. He learned it from his father, Nelson Stewart, a man who used to throw wrenches and profanity-laced tirades when his son didn't win go-cart races.

Nelson used to stand in the corner of the racetrack and point to his head as his son passed, a gesture to constantly remind him to use his head. As a child, Stewart thought the gesture demeaning. Last August, in Stewart's crowning moment as a driver, his father was in the second turn of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, again pointing to his head while his son was winning the Brickyard 400.

After the race, Stewart stopped in the second turn, got out of his Chevrolet, and climbed the fence to salute his father. It's not often Nelson smiles, but on that day, his son finally managed to please him.

"I'll be honest, I don't know -- the only two things I can think of, I haven't been married yet and haven't had children, and those are the only things that I can think would possibly be greater experiences than what I had (at Indianapolis)," Stewart said. "I started to get nervous because my dad kept hanging over the railing further and further, and I thought he would be eventually go over the railing. But to have your family involved -- and not only have them involved but when you can be on the racetrack and actually physically see them once every lap -- that just adds to that experience and adds to that excitement."

Then Stewart, a driver whose anger earned him the nickname "Tony the Terrible," admitted he drove the final few laps at Indianapolis with tears in his eyes.

"It's not a bad feeling to have," he said. "As long as it's not painful tears, it's a pretty good feeling to have."

Stewart was able to fix a lot of things in his life last year. He not only learned to better appreciate his race team, he moved back home to Columbus, Ind. He remodeled the house he grew up in, leaving his bedroom and his parents' bedroom exactly as it was when he was a child. He made an important and lasting connection with his father. And he won another championship.

The move home was important. It became a place far away from stock-car racing's fast lane in Charlotte, N.C. It was a safe haven where Stewart didn't have to fight, where he didn't have to argue, where he could trust his neighbors. He was off the clock and allowed to do whatever he wanted without criticism or judgment.

"They didn't want anything from him; they just wanted him to be happy," said his mother, Pam Boas.

At 34, Stewart already has won an IRL IndyCar championship, two Nextel Cup Series championships, USAC Midget, Silver Crown and Sprint Car championships and a World Karting title.

Only now, he's having fun.

"Tony drives the same," Mark Martin said. "He definitely has learned to handle situations better through experience, and that's a hard thing to do, but like Jeff (Gordon) said, I don't believe the trophy makes the man. Tony Stewart is the greatest race-car driver I've watched drive in this era.

"A.J. Foyt might have been that when I was a little boy, but Tony Stewart is my driving hero."

Zipadelli has calming influence on Stewart

Relationships are fleeting in NASCAR. The best combinations of crew chiefs and drivers usually don't last as long as presidential terms. Ideas get stale, and that usually leads to failure.

Of the eight active drivers who've won a Nextel Cup Series championship, only two -- Stewart and Matt Kenseth -- had their same crew chief two years after winning the championship. Zipadelli and Stewart are starting their eighth year together. That's an eternity in racing, and their bond seems to be getting stronger.

"We're a better team now than we were four years ago (when Stewart won his first Nextel Cup championship)," Zipadelli said. "And we're getting stronger."

His team now can concentrate solely on making their car faster instead of making excuses for his behavior. When he won the 2002 championship, that season was marred by an incident at Indianapolis when Stewart punched a photographer after the race. His sponsor fined him -- a first in the sport -- and ordered him to anger management. There were other on-track problems, including a post-race crash with Jeff Gordon at Bristol, Tenn. Even as he accepted the championship trophy at the end of the year, he was on probation.

When he went home to Indiana, Stewart knew he was in trouble, his mother said. He didn't spend time thinking about what he accomplished, but the way he went about doing it. He was tired of fighting.

"He came home and said, 'What am I doing? What am I saying?,'" Boas said. "It was time to grow up."

That's why last year's championship was so important. It was vindication for all the trouble he caused Joe Gibbs Racing. It was redemption for all the hate mail his sponsor received. At long last, the focus was on the racing, not his behavior. His championship turned into a true celebration.

"I'm just so happy we could get this championship the right way with the hell I put this team through in 2002. It's nice to finally do one right. We got back to making it simple again. None of us got into racing because we thought we'd be collecting a $5.8 million check (in bonuses) at the end of the season. We did it for the thrill of winning races."

Stewart doesn't like talking about his past. Since he's learned to be happy, he wants to concentrate on the future. While there are race victories, more than $50 million in stock-car earnings and a closet full of championship trophies in his past, there are dark days as well -- days better off left in the past.

"I don't want to dwell on the past," he said. "I hope everyone else respects that."

And that's fine with Zipadelli.

"He worked at playing a bigger role and getting closer to everyone else associated with the car. Obviously, that made my job and everyone else's a little easier," he said. "He's been through ups and downs, but that was part of him maturing. We won this championship because of him, because of his attitude, because of his winning ways and his efforts."

Last year Zipadelli constantly reminded Stewart that it took far less effort to be happy than to be mad. It was something Stewart never forgot. They developed a catch-phrase that became their personal battle cry: "Leave the ears on the dog."

Zipadelli told ESPN he talked with Stewart about his anger, comparing it to an injured dog. Zipadelli said if Stewart saw an injured dog on the side of the road, he wouldn't stop to kick it. In short, don't look for trouble.

Zipadelli called that out on the team's two-way radio several times during races last year, especially when Stewart's car was ill-handling or traffic was especially frustrating.

Unlike the past, Stewart listened. And more important, understood.

Stewart humbly accepts his role as racing leader

Stewart knows his fame is fleeting. He knows the next hotshot is waiting to take his place, just like Dale Earnhardt replaced Richard Petty and Jeff Gordon replaced Dale Earnhardt.

"I just keep reminding myself that I am too lazy to work a real job," he said. "If I can make money driving a race car, that's one more day I don't have to sit in a cubicle. I'm fearful of small spaces. I enjoy (racing). It's not a matter of speed; it's strictly the competition."

Now that he's won at Indianapolis, his next goal is the Daytona 500. He led 107 of 203 laps last year, only to get shuffled out of the lead in the final eight laps to finish seventh. While his absence from testing doesn't seem like an important step toward fulfilling that goal, staying busy in his Midget and sports cars keeps him emotionally sharp.

"I'm really happy with what I've done," Stewart said. "I mean, there's a lot of guys that haven't won the Daytona 500, but I think they've had great careers. You look at Rusty Wallace and Mark Martin: They haven't won the Daytona 500, but I don't think anybody is going to say they haven't had great careers and successful careers in NASCAR. Michael Waltrip has won the Daytona 500 twice and never won a championship. And he's won, I think, only (four) races in his career. I don't think anybody is going to say he's had a great career just because he's won the Daytona 500.

"I think there's other determining factors on whether you've had a successful career in the series other than just one race."

Stewart will start 15th in this year's Daytona 500.

He also has learned to accept his role as a leader in the sport. While some fans still boo him, he's turned many of his distracters into fans. With that, of course, comes more responsibility to play the role. The more the public wants, the harder it is to be nice.

As long as Stewart can retreat to Columbus or to one of his sprint cars, he feels he can maintain his newfound balance.

"Fifty percent of the fans pull for Jeff Gordon, and 50 percent pull for anybody but him," he said. "When you get to that level, I think it's an honor to have 50 percent of the fans pulling for you and the other 50 percent wanting one of the other 42 drivers.

"Who knows what the future is going to be like? It's kind of funny, I mean we've kind of been down the same path that Darrell Waltrip went down and the same path that Earnhardt has went down. We've been to the part where everybody hated us and to the part where 50 percent like us and 50 percent hate us. So I kind of feel like we're in a really good spot right now."

Stewart admits he plays hard -- sometimes too hard. The arm and ribs injury at Tulsa was a reminder that life in the fast lane sometimes comes with risks.

"I think we've accomplished that goal of spreading ourselves too thin," he said. "We desperately pray that cloning thing starts working out. We think we'll be able to do twice as much, and I'll quit all the testing and let the clone do the testing and I'll just do the racing and they can do the media sessions and all that."

Stewart has lived most of his life like he's not afraid to die. He has a hearse parked in his driveway at home and continues to be a daredevil in the same light as a rock star: Live hard and leave a young corpse. That part, he said, will never change.

While he has learned to harness the anger, he will never walk away from the competition.

Would racing want anything else?