Stewart will race at Talladega today, but made the trip with Modified competitor Bobby Hutchens, the competition director for Tony Stewart Racing, to see a race at Bowman Gray for the first time.
"We're doing the big track and the little track at the same time," Stewart said.
Hutchens wasn't initially planning on competing in last night's season opener, but logistics worked out and Stewart encouraged him to do it.
"Tony and I were talking Monday at the shop about him running at Paducah, Ky., Thursday night (in a Late Model dirt car) and Gastonia on Friday night (in a Sprint car)," Hutchens said. "He said he didn't have anywhere to run Saturday night. I told him if he wanted to run a Modified we'd go to the stadium. He said, ‘I'm not going to run it but you can and we'll both go.' So here we are."
Stewart, who was lending Hutchens' crew a hand in the pits before the race, said: "Bobby watched me Thursday and Friday, so I'm watching him tonight."
Asked what he had heard about Bowman Gray Stadium, which began its 61st season of stock-car racing last night, Stewart said: "A little bit of everything."
Stewart and Hutchens left immediately after the race to fly to Talladega.
Stewart said he'd like to return someday and race on the stadium's tight and flat quarter-mile track, where NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series (then Grand National) competed until 1972.
"Oh yeah," Stewart said. "I like running everywhere, places I've never been to."
