Well apparently Tony, for one, doesn’t. Here’s a reminder.
“If they wanna block, that’s what’s gonna happen to ‘em every time, for the rest of my career,” Stewart said after dumping Brian Vickers at Sonoma last year. “I’m not gonna tolerate it. I don’t race guys that way and I’m not gonna let anybody race me that way. So if they block, they get dumped.
“There are 42 guys out there and they know now how I race and what I expect. I don’t race ‘em that way, I don’t block guys and I’m not gonna block guys. If they block me, they will suffer the consequences.”
But at Talladega, Stewart found himself in the place no one wants to be. Out front and all alone in the center of the track. He drifted high in attempt to slow the fast closing Matt Kenseth then dove low in a late move to get in front of Michael Waltrip. Way too late.
Afterwards Stewart took full credit, or blame, for the accident that collected 25 cars.
“I just screwed up,” Stewart said, with a strange smirk on his face through most of the explanation. “I turned down across, I think it was Michael, and crashed the whole field. It was my fault, blocking to try and stay where I was at, so I take 100 percent of the blame. I was trying to win the race and I was trying to stay ahead of Matt. Michael got a great run on the bottom and had a big head of steam. When I turned down I turned down across the right front of his car so I just made a mistake on my part, but it cost a lot of people a bad day because of it.”
Few seemed to blame Stewart. Not even Waltrip.
"I don't blame Tony at all because anybody in the world would have had to block like that,'' he said. "That's what you had to do on the last lap.''
Only Clint Bowyer had mild rebuke for Stewart.
“The 14, hung a pretty hard left on Michael there and turned him and kind of wrecked everybody, but he did what he had to do,” he said. Bowyer himself was drilled by Kenseth on the backstraight, nearly pushing Bowyer off the track. But Kenseth had the good sense to do it on the straightaway.
Afterwards, Stewart got a lot of credit for taking the blame. A class act some said. Hard to figure out why. Maybe it’s because it happened at Talladega and nothing really counts there.
But if you ask me, blocking’s blocking and Stewart better be looking in his rearview mirror at Charlotte. There are 25 drivers with a reason to dump him.
No one asked you.
ReplyDeleteThere is a difference between blocking in the last corner, on the last lap of a race and blocking during the middle of a race just to hold up a faster car. It's a shame the field was wrecked but overall- I was happy with the race.
ReplyDeleteLast corner or not, Tony screwed up and looks like a bigger idiot for all his complaining about blocking in the past. When he "dumped" Vickers at Sonoma, Brian wasn't even blocking him. The big difference is not that it was the last lap but that it was at 200 mph at Talladega and 25 cars were involved.
ReplyDeletewhat a mouth, tony has,an what a fit he threw about blocking!every driver that he wrecked, should knock him into the wall! what a loud mouth an a disgrace, as a driver!
ReplyDeleteYeah, Tony is eating some crow now. Hope it's tasty Smoke! But up until that incident, I thought it was a pretty exciting race. The last 10 laps had me on the edge of the couch holding my breath a few times.
ReplyDeleteThe bigger picture is what Waltrip and Mears may have been able to accomplish.
ReplyDeleteMears running up front in an underfunded car, and Waltrip a part time driver.
We'll never know now, but what could have been...
Wow. Looks like someone has a dislike for Mr. Stewart and is trying to start controversy when there is none. A strange smirk on his face? Yeah, its called embarrassment. As in, I screwed up, I ruined alot of people's day and there is nothing I can do about it. Your obviously implying the smirk was because he did it on purpose, which is absolutely laughable. Every driver out there would have done the same thing in the same circumstances.
ReplyDeleteDo you even follow Nascar or did you just watch the highlights on Sportscenter and write a blog on what you saw. To say that 25 guys want to dump him because of what happens 100 times a race at a plate track shows your just trying to create controvery when there is none.