Tony Stewart Finally Reveals Story Behind Famous NASCAR Moniker

Throughout his long and illustrious career across NASCAR and various other formats of racing, Tony Stewart built a name for himself both on and off the race track. Several of his fans appear to call the present-day NHRA driver “Smoke” as his nickname. So where and how did this nickname come about?

Recently, Stewart-Haas Racing dropped a video on YouTube where the team’s co-owner Stewart and his drivers across the Cup and Xfinity teams answered certain questions. One such question was regarding the origin story of Stewart’s iconic nickname.

Tony Stewart explains how he received his iconic nickname

Revealing the origin of that nickname, Stewart mentioned, “From driving pavement sprint cars. I wasn’t very good at throttle control initially with the first team I drove for so just had that haze of smoke off the tire and it stuck.”

Meanwhile, his drivers delivered all sorts of speculations behind the nickname, most of them arguing that it had something to do with tire smoke or something like that. Although, Cole Custer stated that he had heard two stories behind this nickname. It was either from Stewart doing burnouts or “from blowing engines in his IndyCar days.” 2014 Cup champion Kevin Harvick mentioned that it was probably because Stewart was “always on the verge of exploding mad.”

Chase Briscoe mentioned, “I was always told it was when he went and ran chili bowl. He wasn’t supposed to run Chili Bowl. He ended up running under the name Smoke Johnson and ran under Smoke Johnson. And that’s why they call him smoke.” 

Out of all of the teammates, Aric Almirola seemed to have the closest answer, stating that it may have come from smoking the tires of a Sprint car. Lastly, Ryan Preece remained absolutely clueless.

SHR drivers guess Tony Stewart’s favourite food

Moving further into the video, there was a segment where everyone was asked about Stewart’s favorite food item. There had been some confusion regarding what would classify as his favorite, but Preece and Harvick seemed to be the closest with their answers.

Meanwhile, Briscoe seemed to have no idea regarding this subject and just randomly suggested, “steak”. His teammate, Almirola stated that Stewart loved sweets, especially Oreos. But when told, that the bossman’s answer had been something else, the Roval race winner stated that it was a lie.

Harvick kept it simple that “any food” could be considered Stewart’s favorite. Custer stated, “Raw Spaghettios? I don’t know.” Then Preece mentioned, “Pizza.” Finally, Stewart revealed his choice, stating, “Anything, actually I would say pizza.” Later on, when Preece heard that his answer was absolutely on point he felt happy about it.

About the author

Srijan Mandal

Srijan Mandal is the Lead NASCAR Editor and Strategist at The Sportsrush with a wealth of experience and expertise in the world of motorsports. With several thousand articles under his belt over the years, he has established himself as a leading authority on all things racing. His passion for motorsports started at a young age, and he has dedicated his career to covering the sport in all its forms. He is an expert in various disciplines, including stock car racing, American motorsports, Formula 1, IndyCar, NHRA, MotoGP, WRC, WEC, and several more. But Srijan's love for racing goes beyond his writing. He actively competes in professional open-wheel sim racing, using '88' as his racing number. While he mostly participates in GT Endurance classes, he also ventures into Stock Car racing from time to time. In case, you wish to contact Srijan, kindly send an email to him at [email protected] or just DM him on Twitter.

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