Tony Stewart Reveals His Biggest Racing Accolade and the First Choice May Surprise NASCAR Fans
Tony Stewart has stacked victories and championships across a wide range of motorsport disciplines, ascertaining he can hold his own on just about any surface. But when the conversation shifts to the accolade closest to his heart, Stewart points to two achievements that continue to stand tall.
Stewart’s racing career has three NASCAR Cup Series championships, the 1997 IndyCar Series championship, and a 2025 NHRA Top Fuel regular-season title.
He is enshrined in the NASCAR Hall of Fame (2020) and the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America (2019), and he claimed the USAC Triple Crown in 1995, along with the 2006 IROC championship. Even today, he remains active in NHRA drag racing, a world he had never touched behind the wheel until his wife stepped away to focus on expanding their family.
In Stewart‘s May 2025 interview with Rubbin is Racing, he said, “I think winning the USAC triple crown in ’95, winning the national midget, national sprint, and the silver crown championships all in the same season. That’s something that I’m forever going to be proud of.”
Stewart’s pride is rooted in the scale of the challenge. Winning one of those titles requires immense skill. Winning two demands even more. Taking all three in a single season sits on an entirely different level. Only eight drivers in history have earned the USAC Triple Crown, which requires capturing the national midget, national sprint and Silver Crown championships at least once across a career.
Those eight are Pancho Carter, Stewart, Dave Darland, J. J. Yeley, Jerry Coons Jr., Tracy Hines, Chris Windom and Logan Seavey. Among them, only Stewart and Yeley completed the sweep in a single season, while the remaining six reached the milestone by winning their championships in different years.
Stewart singled out one more achievement that lives in the front row of his memory: “The championship at Homestead in 2011 with all the drama that happened that day… We had rain delays. We had car damage not once but twice that we had to go to the back to fix. A bad pit stop that was late in the race that put us in a bad spot. And then a strategy at the end of trying to save fuel.”
He recalled Carl Edwards leading the race while he ran second, and the radio call from his crew chief telling him to start saving fuel. The only way to stretch mileage is to ease off, even with the leader sitting four or five car lengths ahead. In that moment, he genuinely believed the championship trophy was slipping from his grasp.
However, Stewart also knew that his crew chief and data engineers were poring over every number. They were analyzing fuel calculations while the computers and calculators “went berserk,” working to pinpoint the exact margin needed to reach the finish.
That fuel-saving strategy ultimately vaulted the No. 14 SHR driver into the track position that sealed the race and the title. And for Stewart, the way his team rose to that moment stands alongside his USAC Triple Crown as a point of deep pride, sketching a day when collective precision carried as much weight as his own driving.
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