(Daytona) On October 28, Tony Stewart visited Daytona to see how the repaving was coming along and help paint the beginning of the finish line. After taking a long drive around the speedway with Speedway President Joie Chitwood and North American Testing Company's Senior Director of Construction Bill Braniff. Stewart's excitement was downright palpable! Like a kid in a candy store, he was all grins from ear to ear talking about how wonderful everything looked and how smooth the track was. Tony stated that the racing here was going to be unbelievably exciting for the Daytona 500 and fans are not going to want to miss it! He predicted five wide, all out racing like we've never seen before. If Stewart's predictions are right, the racing for the 2011 Daytona 500 should be something we've never experienced before!
Then much to Stewart's delight, he was presented a core piece of the track from the finish line area, for a souvenir of the old track and it's glorious history. Stewart was thrilled, replying with, “As you grow up in racing and as the years go by, you learn the history where you go to and importance of the venues you go to,” Stewart said. “To think of the great champions that crossed over this piece of asphalt to win the biggest races of their career. Whether it was in the Rolex 24 Hour race, or the Daytona 500 or the Nationwide race, the Firecracker 400 even. Think of the great people that have crossed over the start/finish line. This is a piece of racing history that you can’t put a price tag on this.”
Stewart talked about the overall track conditions and how amazed he was at the progress and quality of the job. While talking about his drive around the track a Chevrolet Camaro, Stewart said, “I got to rip through 3 and 4 and it’s not the same race track. This place is going to have a totally new look and a totally new feel to the drivers and teams. It’s going to be a lot of fun. I can promise you that we are going to fill every square inch of this race track with cars now because we’re going to have that flexibility because this surface is going to be in such great shape when they get done with this last layer.”
When asked about winning the Daytona 500, Stewart replied,"I just have a problem with timing, I figured out how to do it on Saturday, I've just got to figure out how to do it on Sunday." Besides trying to figure out how to win the Daytona 500, Stewart is also working on his own track, Eldora and figuring out new ways to market and promote a small, dirt short track in the midwest during tough economic times. So, I asked Stewart if he could relate to this process more because he IS a track owner and he replied tht he could definitely relate more because of his own track, even though it's not an asphalt track. He just found this whole process fascinating.
In the meantime, I found it fascinating that the young driver, who was so tempermental in our sport a few years ago, has developed into a former Champion, a track owner, and is now a Sprint Cup team owner as well as continuing driver duties full-time. One moment with Stewart's PR man, and asking him how Tony keeps up with his massive schedule of activity now, and he replied, "there's an army of people around him." Without a doubt, our sport and Tony Stewart have come a long way! And if everything, everyone is saying comes to pass, the Daytona 500 for 2011 should be something else to watch!
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