Hats off to Tony

T

TN-Ward-Fan

Guest
He could have quit today, and took one helluva points hit. He didn't, and minimized the damage. Days like today are what wins championships. It's a two horse race now, and Mark has to beat him. Considering the remaining tracks, I don't think Mark made up enough ground today to do it, barring some terrible luck on Tony's part.

I ain't crowning him just yet, but that fat lady sure is getting warmed up.

My heart says Mark, but my eyes are a different story this late in the season.
 
I'm thinking the same here. Even with Smoke having a very poor car most of the day, he only lost 59 points. Martin certainly has to be much better than Smoke the last two races. And if he's fined 25 points, he'll be 112 out again. 87 or 112, he has to be very good and get alittle luck. Certainly still possible.

The fat lady was picked out, hummed a few bars and then sat down again :)
 
You aint kidding at all on that one, it coulda been a WHOLE lot worse..
 
Tony didn't take that big of a hit. He's just frustrated b/c he wanted to win.
 
You have to wonder if the car was completely the problem, or the driver might be getting drained.
 
Originally posted by rpmallen
You have to wonder if the car was completely the problem, or the driver might be getting drained.
Click to expand...

Intersting question. But I don't think he would have made the charge at the end if he was drained. I'd think he would falter towards the end of races if that were the case. Who knows, he did look really beat when he said the S word. :)
 
Any given raceday a driver can have a car that is not worth a crap,and no matter what you do to it,the darn thing just won't come to the track. ;) This is a true test of decipline in a driver that has to endure this situation.
 
Tony did an excellent job not only of hanging with a miserable racecar, but managing to keep it out of the walls and harms way.

Tony complained about the car from the drop of the green flag vehemently over the radio. From what he is reported to have said the car not only handled poorly, but the poor handling characteristics were constantly changing. He never knew what the car would do next from one lap to another and sometimes from one end of the track to the other.
 
Originally posted by rpmallen
You have to wonder if the car was completely the problem, or the driver might be getting drained.
Click to expand...

Doubt he's drained, he usually runs a much more hectic schedule than here lately, running all kinds of different races during the week. But he stopped all that a couple of weeks ago to focus on the championship.
 
The season doesn't have him drained. But wrestling the demon all day likely took its toll.

A calmer Tony in post race:

TONY STEWART, NO. 20 HOME DEPOT PONTIAC GRAND PRIX:

"I don't know where we missed at the beginning of the day, but it certainly wasn't the car we ended Happy Hour with, by any means. The good thing was that Zippy never gave up and I never gave up. Even when I got a lap down, Zippy probably did the best job of everybody today in keeping us on good pit strategy, and at the end there, finally made a change that really made the car respond. Zip made a pretty gutsy call there at the end that really helped us out and got us a lot of positions. We turned a potentially disastrous day into just a bad day. As much as we're disappointed about it, things could've been a lot worse. I'm real proud of Zippy and the call he made at the end of the race and the fact that the guys kept digging all day and I kept digging all day.

"I'm used up. I'm wore out right now, but still real happy that we are where we are at right now. Now we've got two weeks to go. If we can just put two solid runs together everything will work out fine."
 
I think the car was just crap the entire race. It happens sometimes, Tony did a good job to keep it out of harms way. Being in the championship hunt put a lot of pressure on him to keep it out of the wall and keep his lead. That deserves some congratulations.
 
After the last 5 weeks, there is no question who the most talented driver out there is.

Stewart is in a class of his own, far above and beyond the rest of the field.
 
Originally posted by paul
After the last 5 weeks, there is no question who the most talented driver out there is.

Stewart is in a class of his own, far above and beyond the rest of the field.
Click to expand...

Let's not go overboard here...
 
Hey, this guy is driving like no one I've seen in a long, long time.

He comes to race, plain and simple.

His show at M'ville and Atlanta...coming through the field like that, was some of the best driving I've seen.
 
He's driving like a champion should drive --- flat-out, balls-to-the-wall, taking what the track and the car will give you and then some. Kicking butt and taking names.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom