Tony Stewart, driver of the No. 14 Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy/Office Depot Chevrolet for SHR, finished 24th.

Greg Biffle won the Samsung Mobile 500 to score his 17th career Sprint Cup victory, his first of the season and his second at Texas.

Jimmie Johnson finished 3.235 seconds behind Biffle in the runner-up spot, while Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon and Matt Kenseth rounded out the top-five. Pole-sitter Martin Truex Jr., Kasey Kahne, Carl Edwards, Kevin Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr., comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were two caution periods for 10 laps, with seven drivers failing to finish the 334-lap race.

With round seven of 36 complete, Stewart leads the SHR contingent in the championship point standings. He is seventh with 234 points, 39 behind series leader Biffle. Newman is ninth with 225 points, 48 out of first.

The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule is the STP 400 on Sunday, April 22 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City. The race starts at 1 p.m. EDT, with live coverage provided by FOX beginning with its pre-race show at 12:30 p.m.

The winner of two races already this season – both of which came at intermediate-style tracks like the 1.5-mile Texas oval – finished an uncharacteristic 24th, two laps down to race-winner Greg Biffle.

“We just couldn’t get the handle on this thing tonight,” Stewart said. “We started off really loose and then we sort of went the other way, and I needed to be freed up. We chased it all night. We’ll go back to the shop, tear it apart and see what the deal is.”

The finish culminated a long weekend for the No. 14 team, as its Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy/Office Depot Chevrolet proved fitful in Thursday’s two practice sessions. Stewart and Co. hoped for better results in final practice Friday but instead Stewart brushed the turn four wall in the opening minutes of the session. With little track time available before Sprint Cup qualifying, the team elected to bring out the backup car from the Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) transporter for some practice laps. Stewart qualified a respectable 29th considering the circumstances.

With the backup No. 14 Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy/Office Depot Chevrolet being the same racecar Stewart used to lead seven times for a race-high 173 laps en route to his victory last November at Texas, hopes were high that 500 racing miles in the Samsung Mobile 500 would allow the team opportunities to improve the car on each pit stop.

Unfortunately, there were only two caution periods throughout the 334-lap race, which meant all but two of the No. 14 team’s seven pit stops came under green-flag conditions. And with a blistering pace being set by the leaders, it conspired to leave Stewart two laps down in 24th.

Ryan Newman, driver of the No. 39 U.S. Army Chevrolet for SHR, finished 21st. He also battled an ill-handling racecar and, like Stewart, finished two laps down. Only 12 cars finished on the lead lap.

Biffle’s win in the Samsung Mobile 500 was his 17th career Sprint Cup victory, his first of the season and his second at Texas.

Jimmie Johnson finished 3.235 seconds behind Biffle in the runner-up spot, while Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon and Matt Kenseth rounded out the top-five. Polesitter Martin Truex Jr., Kasey Kahne, Carl Edwards, Kevin Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr., comprised the remainder of the top-10.

The two caution periods totaled 10 laps, and seven drivers failed to finish.

With round seven of 36 complete, Stewart leads the SHR contingent in the championship point standings. He is seventh with 234 points, 39 behind series leader Biffle. Newman is ninth with 225 points, 48 out of first.

The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule is the STP 400 on Sunday, April 22 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kan. The race starts at 1 p.m. EDT, with live coverage provided by FOX beginning with its pre-race show at 12:30 p.m.

Newman, driver of the No. 39 U.S. Army Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR), never could get the car to handle to his liking during the 334-lap race. With the final 234 laps being run caution free, crew chief Tony Gibson had fewer pit stops than normal to attempt different chassis setups. Only 12 cars finished on the lead lap, while Newman finished 332 of the 334 circuits around the 1.5-mile oval.

“We just couldn’t get the car where we needed it” Newman said. “Tony Gibson and the U.S. Army crew gave it all they had, but the car just wouldn’t respond. Our U.S. Army Soldiers adapt and overcome all the time, and we’ll do the same next week when we get back on track at Kansas. Our Army Strong Soldiers don’t get down and give up, and neither do we.”

After starting sixth, it was apparent early on that Newman’s car was not performing as the team had hoped. He fell outside of the top-15 as he and several other competitors reported their cars suffered from extremely loose handling. After chassis adjustments on the first four pit stops, Newman reported the car was much improved, and hopes were high for a solid finish.

Unfortunately, that feeling was short-lived as the second half of the race proved to be a challenge for Newman and Gibson. They just couldn’t find a setup that made the car a contender as the handling once again became inconsistent.

“It wasn’t for a lack of effort,” Newman said. “It’s tough when the last 234 laps are caution free. You never get bunched up, and you don’t have as many chances to work on the car. Things didn’t go our way today, but we’ll be back stronger next week to complete the mission, which is winning the race.”

Newman’s SHR teammate, Tony Stewart, driver of the No. 14 Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy/Office Depot Chevrolet for SHR, finished 24th, also two laps down.

Greg Biffle won the Samsung Mobile 500 to score his 17th career Sprint Cup victory, his first of the season and his second at Texas.

Jimmie Johnson finished 3.235 seconds behind Biffle in the runner-up spot, while Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon and Matt Kenseth rounded out the top-five. Polesitter Martin Truex Jr., Kasey Kahne, Carl Edwards, Kevin Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr., comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were two caution periods for 10 laps, with seven drivers failing to finish.

With round seven of 36 complete, Stewart leads the SHR contingent in the championship point standings. He is seventh with 234 points, 39 behind series leader Biffle. Newman is ninth with 225 points, 48 out of first.

The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule is the STP 400 on Sunday, April 22 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City. The race starts at 1 p.m. EDT, with live coverage provided by FOX beginning with its pre-race show at 12:30 p.m.

FROM WHAT YOU CAN GATHER WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE IN PERFORMANCE BETWEEN THE CARS? “It is hard to say right now.  We haven’t got a lot of laps on this one.  I think we feel better with this one so far.  It’s doing everything that we were trying to get the other one to do.”

WHAT EXACTLY HAPPENED? “I just got loose and didn’t have enough race track to get it gathered up.  So, driver error.”

TALK ABOUT THE GOOD PERFORMANCE FOR STEWART-HAAS RACING, WHAT DOES THIS SUCCESS FEEL LIKE IN THE MOMENT? “It’s great.  You look in this garage area and you look at the depth of talent, not only drivers, but crews and crew chiefs and car owners here.  It’s an awesome feeling to of had the string that we have had here these last 16 races.  We are really proud of our guys and the hard work.  Every time you think you have gotten 100 percent out of them, they show you they’ve got more.  That is impressive to see as a car owner.  We couldn’t do it without Hendrick Motorsports and the chassis and engine department.  They keep pushing as hard as we do.”

TELL ME ABOUT GOING TO THE WHITE HOUSE NEXT WEEKEND: “I am more worried about what I’m doing here right now to be honest.  Yeah, I’m looking forward to it, but I’ve got a big day tomorrow I’ve got to concentrate on first.”

DOES IT COME AS A SURPRISE TO YOU THAT YOU HAVE STRUGGLED HERE SO FAR THIS WEEKEND? “I mean we tested here too and we ran really well at the test but it was 40 degrees cooler too.  I think we tried some things that we thought were better and it probably was for the conditions, but I’m not sure in the heat it was quite as good.  We are kind of going back the direction that we were last fall now.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE THE TEST MAY HAVE POINTED YOU IN THE WRONG DIRECTION? “I’m not going to say it pointed in the wrong direction but I think we thought we were better with some things that don’t seem to be better with these conditions the way they are.  I think when we were here the stuff we learned was definitely productive, just maybe not for 40 degrees warmer.”

ANY REAL CONCERN ABOUT GOING TO A BACK-UP CAR? “No, not at this level.  The top tier teams, their back-up cars are just as good as their primary cars, so definitely no concerns.”

WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR OVERALL MORAL FOR BOTH CARS ARE WINNING? “It’s just makes everybody at the shop feel good.  They are all working on all the cars anyway.  To have both of us win a race this year and have this strong start to the year that we’ve got it’s huge for an organization.  These guys show up they are smiling they are happy when they get there.  It’s because they are seeing the results of their hard work.”

Overdrive the car and you’ll burn up the tires and burn through fuel. Underdrive the car and you’ll get passed. Where’s the balance?

The balance exists, it just happens to be on the edge of a razor blade. Thankfully for Tony Stewart and his Stewart-Haas Racing team, sponsor Mobil 1 is also a technology partner, whose realm is to find efficiencies under the most extreme conditions, ultimately allowing Stewart to get the most out of his Mobil 1/Office Depot Chevrolet. The on-track laboratory is why Mobil 1 is aligned with the reigning NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion and why the world’s leading synthetic motor oil brand is the official motor oil of NASCAR.

Highlighting this partnership is Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy adorning the hood and rear bumper of Stewart’s No. 14 Mobil 1/Office Depot Chevrolet during this weekend’s Samsung Mobile 500 Sprint Cup event at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth.

The swath of green across the hood and rear bumper is more than skin deep. In promoting Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy, the scheme showcases the technology that’s transferred from a racecar’s 500 pulse-pounding miles between the high-banked corners connecting two main straightaways to a street car’s pounding of the pavement on Main Street.

In the case of Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy, the line of fully synthetic motor oils provide better fuel economy due to its lower viscosity, which means less energy is required to circulate the oil. This results in the engine being more efficient, which leaves more energy to drive the vehicle forward. For the everyday driver, Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy oils deliver up to 2 percent fuel economy improvement. That’s a savings of about six cents per gallon of fuel. (Note that $.06/gallon is based on $3/gallon gasoline. Today, the savings is more like $.08/gallon, given $4/gallon gasoline.)

Like the line of synthetic motor oils he is promoting, Stewart has proven to be incredibly efficient as well. The three-time and reigning Sprint Cup champion has won seven of the last 18 Sprint Cup races dating back to September 2011. And of those seven wins, five have come at intermediate-type ovals – Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill. (September 2011), Texas Motor Speedway (November 2011), Homestead-Miami Speedway (November 2011), Las Vegas Motor Speedway (March 2012) and Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif. (March 2012).

In fact, Stewart is two-for-two in the intermediate tracks visited thus far in 2012 – the 1.5-mile Las Vegas oval and the 2-mile Fontana oval.

Saturday night’s Samsung Mobile 500 marks the third intermediate track the Sprint Cup Series will visit this season, and Stewart has to be the favorite not only because of his 2012 track record, but because of the way he won in his last visit to Texas.

Stewart dominated the AAA Texas 500 in November by leading seven times for a race-high 173 laps. His average speed of 152.705 mph made for the fastest Sprint Cup race in Texas Motor Speedway history, and it moved Stewart to within three points of leader Carl Edwards in the championship standings with just two races remaining. Stewart went on to win the championship, adding to the titles he earned in 2002 and 2005.

The victory was Stewart’s second at Texas, with his first coming in similar fashion in November 2006 when he led eight times for a race-high 278 laps.

In addition to those wins, Stewart has a pole, five top-fives, 11 top-10s and has led a total of 727 laps in his 20 career Sprint Cup starts at Texas. And in the last 14 Sprint Cup races at Texas, Stewart has the best average running position (8.525), the most laps led (712), the best average green-flag speed (173.136 mph), the second-best driver rating (105.8) and has spent a series-high 3,895 laps in the top-15 (83.1 percent).

Augmenting his Sprint Cup success at Texas, Stewart has an IROC win (April 2006) and three IZOD IndyCar Series starts that saw him lead from the pole twice en route to racking up 208 of a possible 624 laps led (33.4 percent).

Now Stewart returns to Texas on the same hot streak he started seven months ago. And with Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy emblazoned on his Mobil 1/Office Depot Chevy, Stewart is blazing his way toward another Sprint Cup title.

TONY STEWART, Driver of the No. 14 Mobil 1/Office Depot Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing:

In your last 14 races at Texas, you’ve earned the second-best driver rating, had the best average running position, the best average green-flag speed , the most laps led and have run in the top-15 a series-best 83.1 percent of the time. How have you been able to adapt to Texas’ layout?

“I’ve found that you can pass anywhere, really. If you get a guy who misses the bottom of the corner and he bobbles, you can get around him. But even if someone doesn’t make a mistake and you’ve got a little better car than they do, the groove has moved up enough over the years to where the track’s a little wider, so you have more room to get a run on a guy. But, as the tires wear out and grip goes away, drivers will make mistakes and a car’s handling will become more important. And, when a guy makes a mistake, you need to be there to capitalize on it. You can really pass anywhere as long as the right opportunity comes up.”

Texas is a track where you’ve been consistently good. Does that make you more comfortable?

“Yes, absolutely. It puts you in a positive frame of mind when you go to a track knowing that you’ve run well there before.”

What is it, specifically, that makes you so comfortable at Texas?

“You have to be comfortable or you’re not going to go fast. The more comfortable I am, the faster we go. This track, the grooves have moved around, especially in the last couple of years. We’ve seen the track get wider and it’s made it to where you can move around on the racetrack and where you can run the top side or the bottom side. It’s nice from a driver’s perspective to be able to have that flexibility behind the steering wheel, knowing that if your car’s not driving exactly the way you want it to, you can move around the racetrack and find a spot the car likes better.

“Any time you put more seasons on a racetrack, the better it gets because it seems like the pavement wears out on the bottom and it makes it to where you can run the top and be fast and you can run the bottom and be fast. It makes the whole racetrack, speed-wise, about the same, versus when they pave a racetrack and the only groove is right on the bottom. The fastest way is the shortest way because it all has the same amount of grip, so the shorter distance is faster. Every year we come here, I think the racing just gets better and better, as far as being able to move around on the racetrack and guys not having to just follow each other and get stuck behind each other. You can actually pass. You can race. You can get away from guys if your car’s fast.”

A lot of drivers talk about turn two at Texas, where it feels like the banking falls out from underneath them. Can you describe that sensation?

“It does. The entry and exit of these corners, they’re very abrupt as far as the banking. When you turn in the corner, it’s very abrupt getting in and falls off very quickly. The reason for that, when they built Texas Motor Speedway, they intended to have the Indy cars race on the apron. That’s why the apron is so wide at Texas. The Indy cars were not originally meant to run on the banking. That’s why the banking on the entry of the corner and exit falls off so fast, so the cars could come from the straightaway from the apron and back up with a smooth transition from the bottom. It makes it a different challenge than what we have at Charlotte or Atlanta because of that. It does make it a lot more challenging to get your car set up for it. You can’t relax on the entry and you can’t relax on the exit of the corner. A lot of times, it’s hard to get your car secure on the entry because you don’t have that banking to hold it. Once you get in the corner, it seems like it’s all right. Same thing happens on the exit. Turn two is the tighter of the two exits of the racetrack. You’re still trying to finish the corner there and you have to keep tugging on the steering wheel and, at the same time, make sure you don’t lose the back (of the car). It definitely falls out from under you. When it does, you have to make sure your car is tight enough to make it through that transition.”

Mobil 1 Advanced Fuel Economy fully synthetic motor oils are engineered to deliver outstanding engine protection and provide improved fuel economy. In racing, how does a driver influence fuel economy?

“I’ve lost a lot more fuel-mileage races than I’ve won. They’re hard. It’s typically a battle between the driver and the crew chief. The crew chief is yelling at you every lap to save fuel, but you’re not slowing down enough and he knows it because he’s looking at the stopwatch.

“It seems a lot of times, everyone running up front is trying to save fuel, and when that happens, you’re in a situation where your speed is dictated off the guy behind you and not off of what you can do. It’s a different style of racing. It’s hard. It’s just as hard, if not tougher, than trying to run 100 percent.”

TONY STEWART’S TEXAS PERFORMANCE PROFILE

× Race length extended due to green-white-checkered finish.
† Qualifying canceled due to weather, starting position set via car owner points.

The driver of the No. 39 U.S. Army Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) prides himself not just on his success on the racetrack, but on his accomplishments off the racetrack, as well.

While Newman’s favorite college class wasn’t calculus – perhaps it was algebra instead (true or false)? – there’s no doubt one of his biggest off-track accomplishments came when he earned his college diploma.

In August 2001, Newman graduated from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., with a bachelor’s degree in vehicle structural engineering. Today, the 11-year NASCAR Sprint Cup Series veteran is the only full-time Sprint Cup driver with a college degree.

For Newman, not going to college was never an option. Although he had long set his sights on a career as a NASCAR driver, his family was insistent he have a backup plan in place just in case his career behind the wheel didn’t pan out. So, he went to college and attended classes, focusing his studies on his passions – racing, cars and engineering.

Newman readily admits the knowledge he gained while in school has proven invaluable to him as a racecar driver. It has also greatly assisted him in his role as a spokesman for the U.S. Army.

The U.S. Army provides millions of dollars in college tuition for Soldiers each year. The Army focuses on education initiatives, as they are vital to the preparedness of the nation’s future workforce and leaders. The strength of the nation is directly dependent on the educational training and achievements of today’s students, which is why the Army strongly supports various education initiatives. Succinctly, the Army is the strength of the Nation, and the Soldier is the strength of the Army.

U.S. Army Soldiers are members of an elite group, for they possess a mental, emotional and physical strength like no other, and the U.S. Army Racing Team reflects those strengths. Newman’s college education embodies this strength and places him in elite company as well, but so do his exploits six races into the 36-race marathon that is the 2012 Sprint Cup season.

Newman has already won a race this year, something perennial race victors Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Kevin Harvick, Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch cannot yet say.

Two weeks ago at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, Newman schooled the field and proved to be “Mr. Opportunity,” as he found himself in the right place at the right time to find victory.

In a race that epitomized the attributes of the Army Strong Soldier – putting the mission first, a never-quit attitude and a refusal to accept defeat – Newman won despite falling one lap down early in the race after serving a penalty for speeding on pit road. Throughout that challenge, Newman and his No. 39 team refused to give up, fought for every spot on the racetrack and earned their first victory of the 2012 season.

The triumph put Newman in good position early in the season for a spot in the elite, 12-driver Chase for the Sprint Cup – the 10-race dash to the season-ending championship.

While it was Newman’s first victory since his win from the pole at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon last July, it was the third victory in the past four races for SHR, and the eighth in the past 16 for the organization.

This weekend, Newman and the entire SHR team plan to continue their winning ways at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth.

While Newman and his SHR teammate and team owner Tony Stewart have been dominant over the last 16 races, the 1.5-mile Texas oval hasn’t been kind to the No. 39 team. In six starts since joining SHR in 2009, Newman and the No. 39 team have not earned a top-10 finish at Texas. But, they’ve also never finished worse than 20^th.

In 17 career Sprint Cup starts at Texas, Newman has two poles, one win (2003), three top-five and three top-10 finishes. Currently eighth in points, Newman hopes to build on his recent victory at Martinsville and capitalize on his team’s momentum. In the past four races, Newman has posted three top-10 finishes.

Regardless of the outcome in Saturday night’s Samsung Mobile 500, Newman will be keenly aware of the information that can be gleaned from this mid-April at Texas. The series will return to the ultra-fast, D-shaped layout in November for the third to last race of the season, and as someone who obviously knows the value of an education, Newman will be learning during each lap in practice, qualifying and the 334-lap Sprint Cup feature.

So, while “schooling” the competition on-track is always good, expanding his knowledge of a track that will play a pivotal role in the 2012 Chase will be even better for both the driver and crewmembers of the No. 39 U.S. Army team.

Lastly, the answer queried at this story’s opening is “false.” Newman’s favorite subject in college was pottery because, as the avid outdoorsman who enjoys working on the farm and restoring old cars says, “I like to work with my hands.” He even has pieces of pottery on display at his log home, which would augment another hand-crafted piece of hardware – the winning trophy from Saturday night’s Samsung Mobile 500.

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 U.S. Army Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing:

How does winning a race early in the season help your confidence throughout the rest of the year?

“It’s big for us from a points standpoint because we gain an advantage in the points, but primarily to give us something to fall back on if we need to win to make it into the Chase. That is a sense of relief, but that relief doesn’t get you anywhere when it comes to performance. It just gives you something to fall back on. Just like a U.S. Army Soldier has a mission, we still have a mission regardless of one victory. And that mission is still to go out there and win each weekend and make the effort to win each and every race and keep moving our way up in the point standings so we don’t have to rely on the win. It is a relief and that’s what we shoot for. But, realistically, it doesn’t matter if it was right now or if it was three races before the Chase.”

You have a degree in vehicle structural engineering. How has that been able to help you in your racing career?

“It’s just taken me to another level, as far as understanding the racecar, the physics part of it, the gravities and the way all the things that work with the racecar, mechanically. That makes a difference to me, personally. I’m not saying it makes me smarter than everybody else, but it’s made me a smarter person to the point that I tell anybody that, if you have the opportunity to go to college or to a university to get a further education, do it. What you major in isn’t what’s going to make you the smart guy, ultimately. It’s the well-roundedness that you come out of any kind of further education with that makes you a better person, and will make you a smarter person in order to make more money and be happier in the future. My actual degree is vehicle structural engineering. It’s a mechanical backbone, but it gave me the opportunity to be flexible in school, and then I obviously have that diploma and that education to fall back on for the rest of my career. As far as what it means for sponsors, I think the fact that I have a college education is something that works very well with the U.S. Army’s goals and objectives. They do education programs at the racetrack where I have the opportunity to talk to students about going to college, and that’s something I’ve really enjoyed doing. I’m very proud to represent the Army and what it is to be ‘Army Strong’ and to have that mental, physical, and emotional strength of no other. At the education programs, we talk about our lives from a driver’s perspective, a team’s perspective, and from the Army’s perspective, and what it is and the ties between NASCAR and the Army. We both have similar goals and we’re trying to achieve our dreams and win battles, but we do it through teamwork and communication, and both of our strategies are pretty much the same.”

What does it say about Stewart-Haas Racing that the organization has won eight of the last 16 races dating back to last season, including three of the last four?

“I joked after the Martinsville win that I was just glad to finally contribute to that total. And while I was joking, I think I was also glad to finally get that win. Our No. 39 U.S. Army team has worked so hard and we’ve been so close. It was nice to finally be in the right place at the right time. And I’m just proud of all of these guys for not giving up and for staying the course and keeping their heads in the game no matter what happened. We proved at Martinsville how Army Strong we were when we came back from a lap down due to an error on my part – a speeding penalty. We stayed tough and confident and, in the end, it paid off for us with a big win. I think the win also showed just how strong Stewart-Haas is. (Tony) Stewart had won on a 2- mile racetrack (California) the week before and then we won on a half-mile racetrack. And Stewart already won on a mile-and-a-half racetrack. So we’ve had a good, strong start to the season when it comes to looking at the racetracks and the places that we race at, and that makes a difference. Some guys are only capable of winning at certain racetracks, and we’ve proved that Stewart-Haas is capable of a lot. We really hope to take advantage of the momentum we have and continue to build on that each and every race. We ran fourth at Las Vegas earlier this season, so it would be nice to have another solid run at another mile-and-a-half track.”

Talk about racing at Texas.

“I always look forward to racing at Texas. I love the speed at Texas. It’s a fast racetrack. Texas is actually one of the fastest tracks we go to all year, so you have to be on top of your game because things can happen pretty quickly. It’s a track I’ve always liked, although it doesn’t necessarily show in my finishes. It’s a smooth, fast racetrack and there are multiple grooves, so it’s fun to race there. The asphalt has aged the track to the point it has gotten better and better each time we come back. What I mean is that the track has basically gotten wider. It’s gotten a bit more character. A little more bumpy, which is fine. I like it. I think that, in general, the track has gotten wider and racier each time we’ve come back. It’s got less grip, but that’s fine. I’d rather slide around a little bit and be in charge of my racecar than be stuck to the racetrack.”

RYAN NEWMAN’S TEXAS SPRINT CUP SERIES PERFORMANCE PROFILE

× Race length extended due to green-white-checkered finish.

† Qualifying canceled due to weather, starting position set via car owner points.

With his second-consecutive victory in Sunday’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, the actions by Stewart and his No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 team spoke even louder than his words at Martinsville.

Stewart left no doubt about this one, leading seven times for a race-high 173 laps around the 1.5-mile oval en route to his fourth victory through the first eight Chase races of 2011. His average speed of 152.705 mph made for the fastest Sprint Cup race in Texas Motor Speedway history, and it moved Stewart to within three points of leader Edwards in the championship with just two races remaining.

“I don’t think we have to say anything, I think our performance today spoke for itself,” said Stewart, who crossed the finish line 1.092 seconds ahead of the second-place-finishing Edwards in scoring his second career victory in 20 starts at Texas, his fourth victory of 2011, and his 43rd victory in 462 career Sprint Cup races. “He (Edwards) knows already, trust me. We had a great Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevy today. It was pretty balanced yesterday (in final practice). We just could not put that big lap up, up front. The big key for us was hanging on for the first 10 laps of a run and it seemed like we could start pulling away after that. Carl kept us honest today, but we did everything we could do. We got all the bonus points we could get and got the win. We gained more than we needed to gain on the average for the week, so we’re doing good.”

Stewart is now just one victory shy of tying 1988 Sprint Cup champion Bill Elliott for 15th on the series’ all-time win list.

All four of Stewart’s victories this season have come during the Chase, which the two-time Sprint Cup champion began eight races ago with back-to-back wins Sept. 9 at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill., and Sept. 25 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon.

Stewart’s consecutive victories at Martinsville and Texas mark the ninth time in his career that he’s notched back-to-back victories. Prior to his consecutive wins at Chicagoland and New Hampshire to start this year’s Chase, the last time Stewart won consecutive races came in July 2007 when he won back-to-back events at Chicagoland and Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Today’s victory also marks the third time in Stewart’s 13-year career that he won consecutive races twice in the same year. He also accomplished the feat in 2000 and 2005, and he has won at least four races in a season five times in his career (2000, 2005, 2006, 2009 and 2011).

Stewart started fifth in today’s third-to-last round of the 10-race Chase and hovered at or near the front throughout the entire 334-lap event, taking the lead briefly for the first time from laps 43 to 45, and for the second time on lap 117 as crew chief Darian Grubb and the Office Depot/Mobil 1 crew worked to fine-tune the handling of Stewart-Haas Racing’s (SHR) No. 14 Chevrolet.

From there, Stewart spent lengthy chunks of time in the race lead, moving into the top spot for a 40-lap stretch on lap 119, for a 41-lap stretch on lap 162, and a 57-lap stretch on lap 207.

A pivotal point in the race came on a lap-274 restart, when Stewart took the green flag outside the race-leading Edwards but powered his way past the No. 99 Ford and back into the lead for another 26 laps until the caution flag flew, sending him and Edwards back to the pits for what turned out to be a final stop for four tires and fuel while several competitors opted to gamble on fuel mileage and stay on the track.

A magnificent pit stop by the Office Depot/Mobil 1 crew got Stewart out ahead of Edwards, and Stewart was able to hold his advantage over the Chase leader while competitors ahead of them peeled off one-by-one in the closing laps to top off their fuel tanks. Stewart inherited the lead for good with just five laps remaining when Jeff Burton pitted for fuel.

“Darian did an awesome job. It’s so hard to do what he does to the car, and he has made the right calls the whole Chase,” Stewart said. “It was like we told DJ (Dale Jarrett, ESPN TV analyst) on that last restart, if I could get the restart on him (Edwards) and get ahead of him, I thought we could stay there. That was the difference, and the guys had an awesome pit stop at the end. If they would not have had that pit stop, we would not be here (in victory lane).”

Ryan Newman, driver of the No. 39 Quicken Loans Carrier Classic Chevrolet Impala for SHR, battled back for a solid 16th-place finish after having to make an unscheduled green-flag pit stop after he felt a vibration following his first pit stop of the day.

Kasey Kahne finished third, while Matt Kenseth and Greg Biffle rounded out the top-five. Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Martin Truex Jr., Clint Bowyer and A.J. Allmendinger comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were five caution periods for 21 laps, with seven drivers failing to finish the 334-lap race.

Stewart and Newman are both in this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup and came into Texas second and 12th, respectively, in the Chase standings. Stewart was eight points behind Edwards while Newman was 89 points out of the top spot. Stewart leaves Texas still second in points, but is now just three markers behind Edwards. Newman remained 12th in the standings and is now 103 points out of first.

With only two races remaining before a champion is crowned following the season finale Nov. 20 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the top-12 drivers competing for the title rank as follows:
1. Carl Edwards (2,316 points)
2. Tony Stewart (2,313 points, -3)
3. Kevin Harvick (2,283 points, -33)
4. Matt Kenseth (2,278 points, -38)
5. Brad Keselowski (2,267 points, -49)
6. Jimmie Johnson (2,261 points, -55)
7. Dale Earnhardt Jr. (2,237 points, -79)
8. Jeff Gordon (2,235 points, -81)
9. Kurt Busch (2,229 points, -87)
10. Denny Hamlin (2,217 points, -99)
11. Kyle Busch (2,216 points, -100)
12. Ryan Newman (2,213 points, -103)

The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule – the penultimate race of the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup – is the Nov. 13 Kobalt Tools 500k at Phoenix International Raceway. The race begins at 3 p.m. EST with live coverage provided by ESPN beginning with a pre-race show at 2 p.m.

After starting 24th in the No. 39 Quicken Loans Carrier Classic Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR), Newman began working his way toward the front of the field while informing crew chief Tony Gibson that his car was a bit loose.

With no caution periods early in the race, Newman headed to pit road for a green-flag pit stop on lap 45, when the Quicken Loans Carrier Classic crew changed four tires, added fuel and made a chassis adjustment.

But two laps after Newman left pit road, he radioed to Gibson that he felt a vibration in his car and thought he might have a loose wheel. One lap later, the vibration became too much and Newman headed back to pit road for an unscheduled green-flag pit stop to change four tires and add a splash of fuel.

Newman returned to the track in 36th place, two laps behind the leaders, while Gibson and other crew members checked each of the four wheels to see if they could figure out what caused the vibration.

“We’re not sure what exactly happened,” Gibson said. “We think something may have gotten between the wheel and the hub so, when the tire changer tightened up the lugnuts, it caused the wheel to bend once it got on track. Still, it’s hard to say until we get back to the shop and look at the tapes and look at the data. It’s just a freak deal.”

From there, Newman and Gibson worked on the handling of the car and gained one of their two laps back by the 350-mile mark of the race.

Then things began to look up for the Quicken Loans Carrier Classic team. On lap 262, the caution came out and Newman and Gibson opted not to pit with the field but, instead, take the “wave-around,” which meant they would be allowed to pass the pace car just before the field went back to green and get back on the lead lap.

When the race restarted on lap 267, Newman was back on the lead lap but needed a caution so he could pit and remain on the same lap as the leaders. It took but three laps for that to happen as the caution came out on lap 270 for debris, which allowed Newman to pit one lap later for four tires, fuel and a chassis adjustment.

On lap 300, several of the top cars began to pit, but Newman stayed on track for several more laps as he had more fuel in his tank due to the later pit stop. This allowed Newman to move into the lead from laps 320 to 323. But, with 11 laps remaining, he was forced to pit for two tires and a splash of fuel. He fell to 19th but managed to gain three positions before the checkered flag fell.

“We had a freak thing happen on that first pit stop,” Newman said. “It’s kind of the way our luck has gone during the Chase. I’m proud of the guys for rallying back and we salvaged a 16th out of it and got back on the lead lap. Just wish we could have given Quicken Loans a better showing for their first race. I’m really looking forward to having them on our car for nine races next season and we’re going to do all we can to get them to victory lane.”

Newman’s SHR teammate, Tony Stewart, driver of the No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevrolet Impala, led seven times for a race-high 173 laps en route to winning the AAA Texas 500.

It was Stewart’s fourth win and 17th top-10 result of 2011, his second win and 11th top-10 in 20 career Sprint Cup starts at Texas, and his 43rd win in 462 career Sprint Cup races. Stewart is now just one victory shy of tying 1988 Sprint Cup champion Bill Elliott for 15th on the series’ all-time win list.

This was the fifth Sprint Cup victory for SHR in 2011, as Newman won in July at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon. SHR now has 12 Sprint Cup victories since its inception in 2009.

Stewart finished 1.092 seconds ahead of runner-up Carl Edwards, while Kasey Kahne, Matt Kenseth and Greg Biffle rounded out the top-five. Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Martin Truex Jr., Clint Bowyer and A.J. Allmendinger comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were five caution periods for 21 laps, with seven drivers failing to finish the 334-lap race.

Stewart and Newman are both in this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup and came into Texas second and 12th, respectively, in the Chase standings. Stewart was eight points behind Chase leader Edwards while Newman was 89 points out of the top spot. Stewart leaves Texas still second in points, but is now just three markers behind series leader Edwards. Newman remained 12th in the standings and is now 103 points out of first.

With only two races remaining before a champion is crowned following the season finale Nov. 20 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the top-12 drivers competing for the title rank as follows:
1. Carl Edwards (2,316 points)
2. Tony Stewart (2,313 points, -3)
3. Kevin Harvick (2,283 points, -33)
4. Matt Kenseth (2,278 points, -38)
5. Brad Keselowski (2,267 points, -49)
6. Jimmie Johnson (2,261 points, -55)
7. Dale Earnhardt Jr. (2,237 points, -79)
8. Jeff Gordon (2,235 points, -81)
9. Kurt Busch (2,229 points, -87)
10. Denny Hamlin (2,217 points, -99)
11. Kyle Busch (2,216 points, -100)
12. Ryan Newman (2,213 points, -103)

The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule – the penultimate race of the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup – is the Nov. 13 Kobalt Tools 500k at Phoenix International Raceway. The race begins at 3 p.m. EST with live coverage provided by ESPN beginning with a pre-race show at 2 p.m.

THE MODERATOR We’re joined in the media center by tonight’s winning crew chief Darian Grubb. This is four now in the Chase. Talk about the momentum the team has going into the final two races.

DARIAN GRUBB: Momentum is huge, just knowing we can get it done. All the guys did a great job on pit road, all the guys in the garage. The car was fast all weekend. Tony gave us great feedback. It was a great weekend all the way around. Hopefully we can take it into the next two weeks.

THE MODERATOR We’ll take questions.

Q. You obviously had a great racecar. There were a couple times during the race Tony hauled it up on his back a little bit. Did you feel at times he was doing a little extra behind the wheel?
DARIAN GRUBB: He definitely did. Just like Martinsville when we were getting ready to go a lap down. He keeps fighting, finds that extra 3/10ths in the car. We fell back. You could tell the handling was going away a little bit. The other guys were running up on him a little bit. He got more speed out of the car and started moving forward after those guys fell off a little bit. He did a great job adapting to what the car needed.

Q. Correct me if I’m wrong. Have there been many instances this season where from start to finish of a race weekend you have been as strong as you were here?
DARIAN GRUBB: I think if you look back early in the season we kind of had some of those same stats going, we just didn’t get the finishes like we needed at the end. Las Vegas is one we qualified, stayed up front, dominated the race, had bad luck and finished second. Kick myself now, because I wish we did two tires there at the end again to pull off that win instead of Carl.

Those are points we knew we gave up early in the season. It’s good to have a weekend like this, give everybody that extra shot of confidence to know they can get it done.

The setups we have are working. Knowing we have the mile and a half come up at Homestead, hopefully we’ll take a lot of these things there and have that same speed.

Q. A question about momentum. Four wins in eight weeks. I may have this a little bit wrong, but when you substituted for Chad you had two wins with Jimmie. Does momentum mean anything to you guys?
DARIAN GRUBB: Yeah, that was two wins in four weeks. It’s definitely momentum and just the attitude that you carry. You come in with a little bit more of a pep in your step and you’re bouncing around because you know you can get it done.

Having that extra confidence means a lot, being able to go in, keep your head up, keep working on everything that you think you need to work on, work through practice plans like you think you need to. When you unload fast, you can afford to work on those things like we did this weekend.

Q. You were around the 99 it seemed like in practice and everything. Talk about the weekend with them. Was it fun? What was it like?
DARIAN GRUBB: It’s definitely fun. It’s one of those things where we go out there and have a good time with it. We do the same job week in and week out regardless of what’s going on around us. When everything happened with the 18 car, it seemed like all the media disappeared away from us. Every camera was in our stall for the first practice, but after that everybody kind of disappeared. Bob and I were joking, I’m going to get up in your face and say, What are you having for dinner tonight?

It’s fun. We have fun with it. We’re all there to get the job done. We’re not there to do the pomp and circumstance and all these other things. We want to do what we’ve got to do to make fast racecars.

Q. It seems like through the first 26 races of the regular season, it was a struggle. Once the Chase starts it’s like this light bulb moment went off. Was there one indeed once the Chase started?
DARIAN GRUBB: I really don’t think so. We had strong cars, we just didn’t get the finishes. We got in a little bit of a slump in the middle of the summer where it seemed like anything we did didn’t go right. We would have a pit call, it would bite us, next week try to do it again. Worked one week, wouldn’t work the next.

Just as the Chase started, we got the momentum on our side with the first two wins. Keep it rolling now. It’s been better ever since.

Q. Were you confident all the way there was no way Burton could make it to the finish?
DARIAN GRUBB: Pretty confident. Just the lap they pitted on, we knew they were going to have a hard time stretching it that far. At that point we were also gaining on them a second a lap. It was going to pretty much add up we were going to catch them there with one or two to go. We were trying to get everything we could get.

Q. When Burton went into the lead and Tony lost a couple of positions after the last fuel stop, you didn’t get panicked? What did you tell Tony over the radio?
DARIAN GRUBB: No, we were pretty confident that they couldn’t make it from that early. If they did, the speed was going to have to be so slow. We thought we could catch them anyway. We told him to worry about the 99 that was behind him. Hopefully it was going to work out. If nothing else, it was going to be a great points day for us and be ahead of Carl. We just have to keep fighting for all those points.

Q. I know the 99 car had a right front tire problem early on. Nobody likes right front tire problems. What were you thinking? Did you see anything at all?
DARIAN GRUBB: We had the same issues. Pretty much everybody in the garage that was running those speeds did. The tire is a good tire. That’s the limit of what you can do. I’m sure Goodyear is going to come back with something a little bit different. If not, the race is even more exciting with that. The way the tires fall off the fuel windows were getting shorted anyway. We had to make sure we take care of it. If you got really tight, you had to be even more careful.

Q. Going into Phoenix, do you look forward to something like that, where you don’t have a whole lot of notes, it’s going to be more I don’t want to say seat of your pants?
DARIAN GRUBB: We really do because it’s something where we did the tire test there, the open test. We have four full days of data that we’ve been digging through for a month and a half. We’re looking forward to going there and seeing if everything we learned while we were there still applies.

The track is going to change while we’re there with all the practice we have. We have to be smart how we adapt to those changes. Hopefully we’re going to have that speed.

THE MODERATOR Thank you very much. Congratulations.

The man next to you doesn’t need any introduction, the winner of tonight’s race, Tony Stewart. It’s his second career win at Texas Motor Speedway and fourth in the Chase. He’s three points back of leader Carl Edwards heading into the final two races.

Tony, talk about your run tonight.

TONY STEWART: I think it was all right (smiling). It was fair. We probably could have done a better job.

I don’t know what we could have done any different. We had a good car to start with and the good thing was it was close enough to where Darian was fine tuning all day. This is a race where the conditions change a bunch from the beginning of the day to the end. I was real proud we were able to adapt all day long.

I don’t know that we ever got out of the top five there the whole race. Seemed like we just kind of stayed there, stayed in the top three or four the whole day. Restarts were key obviously. But we got a really good restart that last one, had the lead coming into the pit stop. Our guys did an awesome job in the pits, got us out ahead of him. That was really the difference, was just being able to get that track position and be able to run our pace versus trying to make something happen to catch him.

THE MODERATOR We’ll take questions for Tony.

Q. Coming into this weekend, I think Carl felt like advantage them here at Texas. You come out and you do this. How big of a message is it to them that maybe what they thought was reality isn’t reality?
TONY STEWART: We tried to tell them that last week, so… It is what it is. I mean, I still stand firm that we’re not counting on them to make mistakes. We’re controlling our destiny. Today is a perfect example of that. We’re worried about what we’re doing. We’re not worried about what they’re doing. We raced our race today. We didn’t do anything worrying about what they were doing or how they were doing things. We just ran our race. That’s what we intend to do the next two weeks.

It’s theirs to lose now. But I don’t know that they have a choice now. I mean, we did what we said we were going to do. We’re going to take it if we want it. Today is a perfect example. We took five points off that deficit today. We have that ability to do that the next two weeks.

Q. Just seems like this championship Chase of yours, you’re having a lot of fun doing it. Has this been the most fun of a championship run you’ve had?
TONY STEWART: I think so. The good thing is we’ve been in this position a lot of times and this isn’t the first time we’ve been in this deal. We have that ability. Like I said, I didn’t think we belonged in the Chase to start with, I didn’t think we were a factor. What do we have to lose? We don’t have anything to lose. I don’t care about second or third in the points. After you won it, second doesn’t really matter.

To me it’s about going out, getting that championship, doing everything you can to accomplish that goal. We’re not a group that’s going to sit here obviously and say, We’ll take the easy road and settle for second. I’d rather finish sixth or seventh in points knowing that we did everything we can to win.

That’s what we’re going to do the next 14 days.

Q. Tony, I know you’re not worried about the 99 and all that. But how cool was it to battle it out with him tonight?
TONY STEWART: It shows what this Chase is going to be about. It’s a good battle right now. I mean, this was a good race today. We never really got far away from each other. At the end it was down to the two of us.

I don’t know if you’re Brian France right now, I would say he’s giddy. If not, he should be, because this is the perfect scenario. It’s the perfect storm, so to speak, going into these last two weeks. That’s what you want. This is about as exciting as it gets, to have two guys that are down to three points with two weeks ago.

Q. He drew a little bit on your picture out there.
TONY STEWART: I saw that. The bad thing is I look really bad to start with. He actually made me look a little better (smiling). I think he was actually a little too infatuated with me to be drawing on me. Kind of scares me he was so concerned about it.

Q. Tony, you talked about this a little bit, but you’ve won a championship before, two of them. Carl has been in the Chase but has not won a title. How much of an advantage, if any at all, is that for your group? How might it be an advantage?
TONY STEWART: It’s definitely an advantage. But I’m not going to tell you why ’cause that’s what I’m going to take to the next two weeks with me. We win this thing, I’ll tell you what the advantage is and why. But there’s an advantage.

Q. Tony, this is the second straight week where on restarts you were so strong coming from the outside, not in the preferred line. How gratifying is that?
TONY STEWART: Yeah, I mean, it’s very gratifying. I thought we were really strong all day on restarts. I mean, we had the one restart where we took off third there. We were two wide with Matt Kenseth going into one for the lead. We’re aggressive right now. It’s like I said, I’m taking charge and trying to control my own destiny. I think the restarts today showed what our intentions are and what we’re about for these next two weeks.

Q. Does it feel odd at all winning four races in the Chase and still being the chaser and not the guy being chased?
TONY STEWART: Not if you look at how bad a race we had at Dover. We had to win four races to make up that deficit of what we got ourselves into at the Dover race.

I’m going to be real disappointed if people are trying to make a story out of a guy that’s got four wins isn’t leading the points. It’s about 10 weeks. You got to be good for 10 weeks. You can’t just sit there and say, You can throw it all away to try to win a race and get there.

We have had to have those four wins to make up for Kansas that we missed an opportunity there, Dover that we just were bad. We’ve had to rebound from that. The good news is our four wins have carried us within three points of the lead. So I’m proud that we’ve been able to fight our way back up to it.

Q. Tony, can you remember the last time you had such a strong weekend from start to finish? You were very confident coming here. You must have felt some reinforcement getting out on the track Friday and being fast in practice and qualifying well.
TONY STEWART: We joke around about the Matt Kenseth syndrome. If he qualifies well, you know he’s going to be good in the race. That was proved today. He qualified well and he was a factor. We’re kind of in that same boat. We’re not known for qualifying. For us to qualify fifth, start that far forward, you got a sense it’s going to be a decent weekend.

The thing that we saw on the lap speeds in practice, we didn’t have that raw speed at the front of a run, but it seemed like after 10 laps we matched those guys that did have the raw speed. It seemed like by lap 15 it was kind of going the other way.

You know that this race most likely is going to be decided in a relatively long run most of the time. The good thing is it did today. Other than the traffic we struggled with at the end, we had a really good long run car and that’s what you need.

Q. Four wins in eight weeks in any Cup season is spectacular. Are you a believer in momentum?
TONY STEWART: It would be hard to not believe in it right now, to be honest. But still when we get to Phoenix next week, what happened this week and last week are over, and you still got to start that weekend from scratch.

I think our group is really good at that. But I think where the momentum carries isn’t when you start on Friday, it’s tonight through Thursday night. It’s the demeanor of the guys, the guys at the shop, how excited they are, knowing these guys are pumped up about what we got going on. When you got them working on your racecar, you want them pumped up and excited about how things are going.

But it’s back to business on Friday. The good thing at the test there, like Darian mentioned, we were really fast at the test. I’m looking forward to getting there.

Q. Last week you told Carl he better worry. He was a little more subdued in here today than last week. Any more words of wisdom for Carl Edwards?
TONY STEWART: I’m pretty sure what we did on the racetrack said everything we needed to tell him today. I mean, I don’t know how you top that. He knows. Trust me, he knows. If he’s out there drawing on me, he knows.

The fun thing is I don’t feel like I have to say anything. I feel like I already got it done.

Q. Clean, professional race today. Is that a function of the track or some guys more sobering reality this week? When you get that kind of race for you, is it a pleasure?
TONY STEWART: We’re not on a half mile anymore. You’re ripping around here, like Darian mentioned. The speeds we were running today, unbelievable how fast we run here at Texas. You’re not going to get guys doing what they did last week. Guys don’t have to get in that position of trying to take chances and put themselves in bad positions to get to the bottom of the racetrack like they had to do last week.

I think you kind of throw last week out of the equation. That’s not normal for this series. You only see it really twice a year at Martinsville. But that is what makes Martinsville exciting. At the same time that’s why I’m glad we don’t run 10 weeks at Martinsville to decide the championship because it would get ugly.

Yeah, it is nice to come here and know you’re not going to have to worry about that. Guys that had dramas last week had clean races today. It just shows that a lot of it’s a product of how fast we’re running here. Guys have a lot more respect for each other here.

Q. Carl said earlier he doesn’t want to count anybody out who is still mathematically alive no matter how far they are. Realistically, he’s the guy you’re worried about?
TONY STEWART: I’m not worried about anybody. I’m worried about what we’re doing, and that’s it. I mean, make no mistakes, understand this when you leave here, for the next two weeks, I don’t care what he does. I didn’t care what he did last week. I didn’t care what he did this week. I was worried about the 14 car and that’s all. That’s why we had the result we had today. We’re not worrying about somebody else or something else.

You’re crazy, the way the race went last week, guys having engine problems, you never can count anybody out of the equation. But I’m one of those guys, I believe there’s 35% of the things that happen on a race weekend that we can control and 65% that we can’t. All I care about is that 35% that we can control. That’s all we’re going to focus on and worry about. The rest of it we’re not going to worry about what they’re doing.

When you got two weekends in a row like we’ve had, we don’t have to do anything different. We just got to keep doing what we’ve been doing, and that’s worrying about our own racecar. Everybody else has to worry about what we’re doing, why and how.

Q. With going into Phoenix and Homestead the next two weeks, it’s been a while since you won at either of those tracks. Do you think you can get back to Victory Lane at either place?
TONY STEWART: Been a while since I won here, but we’re here tonight, aren’t we? I don’t know how you count us out. Been a long time since we won at Martinsville and here. We’ve done it two weeks in a row. Yeah, if I ever had confidence that we can do it, yeah, I feel that we can.

THE MODERATOR Congratulations, Tony.

TONY STEWART: Thank you.

It was Stewart’s fourth win and 17th top-10 result of 2011, his second win and 11th top-10 in 20 career Sprint Cup starts at Texas, and his 43rd win in 462 career Sprint Cup races. Stewart is now just one victory shy of tying 1988 Sprint Cup champion Bill Elliott for 15th on the series’ all-time win list.

All four of Stewart’s victories this season have come during the Chase for the Sprint Cup, which the two-time Sprint Cup champion began eight races ago with back-to-back wins at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill., on Sept. 19 and New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon on Sept. 25. Last Sunday he won at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway and today he led seven times for a race-high 173 laps en route to a 1.092-second victory over runner-up Carl Edwards.

Stewart’s consecutive victories at Martinsville and Texas marked the ninth time in his career where he’s notched back-to-back victories, with the previous occurrence coming earlier this year at Chicagoland and New Hampshire. Prior to this year, the last time Stewart won consecutive races came in July 2007 when he won back-to-back races at Chicagoland and Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Today’s victory also marked the third time in Stewart’s 13-year career that he won consecutive races twice in the same year. He also accomplished the feat in 2000 and 2005 and he has won at least four races in a season five times in his career.

This was the fifth Sprint Cup victory for SHR in 2011, as Stewart’s teammate, Ryan Newman, won in July at New Hampshire. SHR now has 12 Sprint Cup victories since its inception in 2009.

Newman, driver of the No. 39 Quicken Loans Carrier Classic Chevrolet Impala for SHR, battled back for a solid 16th-place finish after having to make an unscheduled green-flag pit stop after he felt a vibration following his first pit stop of the day.

Kasey Kahne finished third, while Matt Kenseth and Greg Biffle rounded out the top-five. Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Martin Truex Jr., Clint Bowyer and A.J. Allmendinger comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were five caution periods for 21 laps, with seven drivers failing to finish the 334-lap race.

Stewart and Newman are both in this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup and came into Texas second and 12th, respectively, in the Chase standings. Stewart was eight points behind Chase leader Edwards while Newman was 89 points out of the top spot. Stewart leaves Texas still second in points, but is now just three markers behind series leader Edwards. Newman remained 12th in the standings and is now 103 points out of first.

With only two races remaining before a champion is crowned following the season finale Nov. 20 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the top-12 drivers competing for the title rank as follows:
1. Carl Edwards (2,316 points)
2. Tony Stewart (2,313 points, -3)
3. Kevin Harvick (2,283 points, -33)
4. Matt Kenseth (2,278 points, -38)
5. Brad Keselowski (2,267 points, -49)
6. Jimmie Johnson (2,261 points, -55)
7. Dale Earnhardt Jr. (2,237 points, -79)
8. Jeff Gordon (2,235 points, -81)
9. Kurt Busch (2,229 points, -87)
10. Denny Hamlin (2,217 points, -99)
11. Kyle Busch (2,216 points, -100)
12. Ryan Newman (2,213 points, -103)

The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule – the penultimate race of the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup – is the Nov. 13 Kobalt Tools 500k at Phoenix International Raceway. The race begins at 3 p.m. EST with live coverage provided by ESPN beginning with a pre-race show at 2 p.m.