NASCAR America: Dissecting Stewart’s win at Sonoma

Dale Jarrett, Jeff Burton and Kyle Petty breakdown Tony Stewart‘s dramatic last-lap win at Sonoma Sunday, his first Sprint Cup win in three years.

NASCAR America: The state of Stewart-Haas Racing

The NASCAR America team talks about the state of Stewart-Haas Racing after Tony Stewart‘s surprising victory at Sonoma.

Gatorade | Beat the Heat | Jimmie Johnson Rides Watkins Glen

As part of the Gatorade Beat the Heat program, Hendrick Motorsports driver Jimmie Johnson gives a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into a race weekend for him and the Hendrick Motorsports 48 pit crew team on-site at the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race in Watkins Glen, New York. The sport of NASCAR has evolved over the years; now, drivers and the crew members make fitness, nutrition and hydration a big part of their preparation and routine to gain an edge on their competition.

NASCAR executive on Townley-Gallagher fight: ‘Certainly not our best moment’

A NASCAR executive stated Monday on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio that “there will be repercussions” for the incident between John Wes Townley and Spencer Gallagher during Saturday night’s Camping World Truck Series race at Gateway Motorsports Park.

Townley and Gallagher had contact during the race that caused Townley’s truck to hit the wall. They both wrecked in the final laps. After exiting their vehicles, they soon began scuffling, tumbling to the track and throwing a few punches.

“We’ll look at the all the video feeds we have, we certainly talked to both drivers postrace,” said Steve O’Donnell, NASCAR executive vice president and chief racing development officer. “We’ll have our discussions. We’ll kind of have an evaluation and talk to everyone about where we stand from that. Certainly not our best moment, for sure, two passionate drivers. That’s part of things sometimes when emotions run high, but certainly don’t like to see that to occur when they’re especially on the racetrack.”

O’Donnell told “The Morning Drive” that a key issue is what led to the final accident between them.

“We certainly like to see drivers who are going to express their emotions be outside of a race car, that’s where we really, really jump in and react when it’s drivers using their race cars beyond what is normal for a race,” O’Donnell said. “We’re going to react heavily when we have to. There will still be repercussions for sure. We want to make sure drivers, if they’re going to do anything, are outside of their car but certainly don’t encourage what happened at Gateway.”

Tony Stewart, who won Sunday’s Sprint Cup race at Sonoma Raceway, said he was looking forward to how NASCAR will react to the Townley-Gallagher incident.

“I can’t wait for (the penalty announcement) because I told Mike Helton I’ve been waiting for this day for a long time to see how much you get fined for a fight,” Stewart said, referring to the NASCAR vice chairman. “He laughed at me. I said, ‘Well, look at it this way, I’ve got a lot of scores to settle with people and I’ve only got six months to do it.’ I’ve just got to figure out if it’s economically feasible to do it, so I’m waiting to see what ‑‑ I’ll be the one by 5 p.m. on Tuesday reading every social media thing out there.

“But I’m going to go to (Townley’s sponsor) Zaxby’s and eat chicken all week just in support of John Wes. Hey, I’m all for it. I’m glad to see somebody had some emotion and actually did something with it. I’m going to live my life through him for this week.”

Denny Hamlin on losing to Tony Stewart: ‘It’s not like I gave him one by any means’

Denny Hamlin did everything he could to hold off a last-lap charge by Tony Stewart, but he just couldn’t hang on.

Stewart got by Hamlin on the final turn of Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway to earn his first win since 2013 – and left Hamlin to ponder how this one got away.

“I shouldn’t have given him that opportunity (on the last lap),” Hamlin said over his team radio.

In a postrace interview on Fox Sports 1, he expanded on that.

“I got in there, didn’t wheel-hop or anything, just slid up a little bit in the middle and allowed him to get a real good run on me,” Hamlin said. “Once (Stewart) had inside position; we weren’t going to drag-race at that point.

“I knew he was going to put me in the wall. He’s doing what he has to do, and we’re trying to do what we have to do. All’s fair in love and war.”

Hamlin finished 0.625 seconds behind Stewart.

“We had a really good car,” Hamlin said in a postrace media session. “Obviously the best road course car I’ve had.”

Hamlin leaves Sonoma still looking for his first career Sprint Cup road course win. His career best at Watkins Glen International also is a second (in 2007).

Hamlin took the lead on the last lap, passing Stewart in Turn 7 after the latter made a mistake by overdriving the turn.

“I thought with two or three (laps) to go, he pretty much had it, but he made a couple mistakes and allowed us to get pretty close,” Hamlin said. “We just both wheel-hopped into 7, and I just let off my wheel-hop a little bit so I could get to his rear bumper and get him out of the groove just a touch.

“It was perfectly executed, but … I didn’t run a low enough line in Turn 11 from wheel-hopping in Turn 7. I got the rears hot, wheel hopped it a little bit again, got out of line, and obviously gave him the inside line. … We definitely had a car that should have won, but we were on the bad end of the deal.”

Hamlin admitted he was worried that if Stewart could get to his back bumper heading into the 11th and final turn of the last lap, that his rival might try to turn him.

“I didn’t know if he would physically spin us out,” Hamlin said. “I thought there was a very good chance of it because that’s his opportunity to get in the Chase ultimately.”

Hamlin then said with a laugh, “I mean, how many more chances is he going to have? I think this is by far the best he’s run all year, and he’s in his final season, so his give a (expletive) factor is probably really low to be honest with you.”

Still, though disappointed at his runner-up finish, Hamlin was philosophical about it, coupled with the relationship he’s had with Stewart – a former teammate, as well – over the years.

“Tony has been ultra fair to me quite a bit,” Hamlin said. “He’s treated me really well my entire career. It’s not like I gave him one by any means. He gave us an opportunity to move him, we did, and then we got it back. It’s just part of the deal.”

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NASCAR says Austin Dillon’s frightening crash launched a dozen safety projects

Austin Dillon’s airborne crash that left a gaping 60-foot hole in the catchfence at Daytona International Speedway last July spawned a dozen safety projects at NASCAR’s R&D Center.

president Steve O’Donnell said in a recent interview with NBC Sports. “But it’s led us to some initiatives with the race teams, through the floorboards, through different protection areas, through some anti-intrusion in the car. We’re working with the teams now to implement as early as 2017, if not earlier, depending on as they develop new cars.”

Two of the most significant wrecks in NASCAR since last year occurred at Daytona: Dillon’s wreck on the last lap in the rain-delayed Coke Zero 400 resulted in five fans being treated for injuries caused by debris from his No. 3 Chevrolet, but the Richard Childress Racing driver walked away.

In the Xfinity Series opener on Feb. 21, 2015, Kyle Busch slammed into an unprotected interior wall in Turn 1 after skidding through fronstretch grass that since has been paved over. Busch missed nearly three months with a broken right leg and fractured left foot.

Last weekend at Sonoma Raceway, Busch was critical of NASCAR for keeping the rules static for Daytona after three cars got airborne May 1 at Talladega Superspeedway. Danica Patrick also was involved in a heavy wreck similar to Busch’s at Daytona.

“As far as rule changes in Daytona, I was certainly hoping that we would see something coming off the race that we saw at Talladega,” Busch said. “No rule changes is not a welcoming sight for me, but it is what it is. We’ll go and crash some more.”

O’Donnell defended NASCAR’s deliberate approach to safety advances, noting that a 2015 initiative in which safety harnesses/belts were mounted to seats instead of the chassis “certainly allowed (Dillon) to walk away” from the Daytona crash.

“If we can see something, we’re going to implement it as quickly as we can, but you’ve got to make sure it works,” O’Donnell said. “To do that, you’ve got to study it, test it and validate it. You’ve got to make sure you get the correct results, and it’ll hold up at high speeds at the track. That’s not just something we can say we think it works. It has to work when we put it in place.

“That’s one of the things that you look at with Austin prior to the crash. The belts adjustment worked. And we’re proud of the fact that worked, and he was able to get up and walk away.”

O’Donnell said NASCAR always was evaluating liftoff speeds but also was focused on the incident involving Matt Kenseth’s No. 20 Toyota, which got airborne during a spin at Talladega.

In the case of the other airborne wrecks at Talladega, and Dillon’s crash at Daytona, the cars took flight after contact with another vehicle.

“Where we’re most concerned is where a car gets airborne on its own,” O’Donnell said. “That’s very rare. If you look at Talladega and the 20 car, that happened. The others are really a result of what we call “ramping up” in terms of Austin Dillon getting into another car and getting airborne, which happened twice at Talladega as well.

“It’s inherent in racing, and it can happen really at any racetrack we’re at, it’s not something we like to see, but where we’re really focused is a car on its own getting sideways, getting up in the air. Still a rare occurrence, but any occurrence is more than we’d like to see, so we’re constantly focused on that.”

Another focus is catchfence technology. O’Donnell hinted in the wake of Dillon’s crash last year that a future iteration “may not be a fence.”

O’Donnell said last week there “still is a lot of ongoing studying with the fencing” but indicated there weren’t any imminent changes. As part of the Daytona Rising overhaul that made its debut in February, Daytona removed the first few rows of grandstands and prevented fans from the “rim road” encircling the track (changes that were planned before Dillon’s crash after airborne wrecks that injured fans in 2012 and ’13).

“First and foremost, the fence did its job” in Dillon’s crash, O’Donnell said. “Its job is to keep that vehicle back on the racetrack side, which it did. Certainly the seating area was adjusted in Daytona, we learned to keep some of the fans off the rim road. As we go forward, we’ll be studying some more aspects with our track safety experts to look at what if anything we can do in addition to the fencing and cabling.”

NASCAR conducts exhaustive internal studies after major crashes similar to Busch’s and Dillon’s. An incident data recorder provides information on rates of acceleration and deceleration, as well as the G forces sustained by a driver at impact. NASCAR also consults with the driver, team members who built the car and sometimes outside experts to consider potential improvements.

After Dillon’s crash, his No. 3 Chevrolet was brought to the R&D Center for a complete teardown (before being returned to the team), and photos and videos gathered at the track also were studied.

“You combine that with the incident data recorder and then you’re able to, when you test and try new things, you can reenact that incident almost in its entirety, and it’s as exact as possible,” O’Donnell said. “You can reconstruct the speeds and angles to see if the new things you’ve put in place did work and are something you want to take the next step with.”

Advancements showing the most promise from the dozen projects launched by Dillon’s crash are in anti-intrusion areas, and O’Donnell said some of the developments involve plates within the cockpit that help protect drivers’ feet. NASCAR also has studied floorboard designs after Busch’s crash and has shared data with teams to develop directions on safety features.

“There are a lot of different things that we’re looking at and also studying what is unique in Austin’s crash,” O’Donnell said. “We’re looking at the floorboards and protecting the foot box area. Those are some of the things if you look specifically at Kyle’s incident that we’ve worked with the teams to try to implement going forward.”

In a buzzword that’s been sounded throughout the industry this year, the research also has become more collaborative this season with the formation of a safety council (one of several new committees introduced with the team charter system).

“I’ve said many times we have some of the smartest people in the industry working on our race teams,” O’Donnell said. “So we’ve worked hand in hand with them as well to look at different safety initiatives. It’s tough to pinpoint a number, but I’d say it’s in the hundreds of folks who are daily focused on safety. Again, it’s safer than it’s ever been, but we’re in a dangerous sport, and we’ve got to learn each and every day and apply those (lessons) as quickly as we can.”

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Who had more fun Sunday, Tony Stewart or crew chief for first career win?

Mike Bugarewicz has a hard enough job as a NASCAR Sprint Cup crew chief.

But that job just got a little easier – at least for one race – after his driver, Tony Stewart, won Sunday at Sonoma.

Not only was it Stewart’s first win since 2013 – and the 49th of his Sprint Cup career – it was also Bugarewicz’s first win atop a Cup pit box.

“I’ve only worked at Stewart-Haas (Racing), this is my third year, (the first) two years with Kevin (Harvick) as his engineer,” Bugarewicz said. “Every win is sweet whether I’m a race engineer or crew chief or whatever, it’s all great.

“It hasn’t sunk in yet that it was my first, but our goal from the beginning of the year was to get Tony back in victory lane, and I’m just so glad that we could get him there.”

Stewart made headlines Friday when he said during his weekly media availability that “driving a Sprint Cup car does not make me happy right now” ,and that is why he’s looking so forward to retiring at season’s end.

But after Sunday’s win, Bugarewicz said his driver’s mindset might have changed a bit more to the positive side of things – and that he certainly had some fun in Sunday’s win.

“I did not remember to ask him that,” Bugarewicz said about failing to ask Stewart if he was having fun before Sunday’s race. “I just assumed by the look of his face that he was enjoying it.

“One thing I will say, no matter what, every week it’s the last thing I say to him before I leave the car and he actually reminded me of that today.

“He said, ‘If I get angry and start yelling at you today, just remind me to have fun.’ I said, ‘Yeah, I know how that’ll work out for me.’ But no, we always talk about that. What’s most important for all of us is just enjoy it, take it in. You have to do that.”

While Bugarewicz and his team did everything they could to help Stewart to victory lane, in the end it was Stewart who did what he needed to do.

That included being mum on the team radio on the final lap.

“I stayed pretty quiet,” Bugarewicz said. “The spotter was keeping in touch with him. He didn’t say much, either.

“In those situations I just like to let (Stewart) concentrate and let him do his thing. He’s got a lot going on, especially at a place like this, so we just let him focus.”

But Bugarewicz also had something that only one other Sprint Cup team (six-time champ Jimmie Johnson) has — a driver with multiple Cup titles.

“Having a three-time champion who knew he had an opportunity today is a big thing,” Bugarewicz said. “At the end of the day, we only won because of his desire and his drive and his want.

“I truly believe that with these competitors and how good all the cars are and these top-tier drivers, that’s all it is. It’s a matter of who wants it more at the end of the day in most cases. Today, Tony wanted it more.”

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