Tony Stewart: He's The Boss

Tony Stewart says the biggest surprise he has had so far as an owner/driver is learning he can roust himself from the sack early.

"I didn't realize there is actually a 6 a.m. until this year," he joked.

The two-time Sprint Cup champion's ownership tenure has, in fact, started surprisingly well. Both of his cars ran top-10 qualifying speeds for Sunday's Daytona 500, and Stewart finished third in the Budweiser Shootout and second in a 150-mile qualifier.

Teammate Ryan Newman had an engine failure in practice and crashed his primary car in his qualifier, but he has looked fast enough to contend for a repeat 500 victory.

The famously and temperamental Stewart has been relaxed, accommodating and playful.

"We got the third place down, we got the second down, so the natural progression is we should win Sunday's race," Stewart said Friday during an appearance with idol A.J. Foyt, whose No. 14 adorns his new red Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet.

Of course, the first green flag hasn't fallen on the regular season, and a lot can go wrong. Stewart still has history working against him, since no owner/driver has contended for a championship since Alan Kulwicki won the title in 1992.

Darrell Waltrip, Ricky Rudd and Bill Elliott wound up selling or folding their teams. Robby Gordon hasn't won a race as an owner, and Michael Waltrip has shown only flickers of promise with his sizable operation.

The hardest thing Stewart will have to learn, Michael Waltrip said, is that "as a driver, you want everything in the world, and as an owner, you have to be fiscally responsible."

Stewart gave up his secure job with powerhouse Joe Gibbs Racing and risked his substantial income - $19 million last year, according to Forbes - to become 50 percent owner of a team that has no victories and only one top-five finish in 284 starts.

Then again, Stewart got his stake in the former Haas CNC Racing mainly for his star power. Engines and chassis from eight-time Cup champion Hendrick Motorsports and a 140,000-square-foot facility with state-of-the-art technology gives the organization the chance to win immediately.

"The good part about it is, he's gone in with an existing team," said 2007 Daytona 500 winner Kevin Harvick, who owns teams in NASCAR's Nationwide and truck divisions. "When it'll really hit is when you get that first penalty for a crew chief or you're not running good and you have to take that first step from an R&D standpoint to get your cars more competitive.

"That usually entails everything you have not being very good. So you have to go out and buy more new stuff when you thought all the stuff you bought was new. The challenges, in my opinion, haven't started for him yet."

Stewart apparently is a glutton for headaches. He owns 12 other businesses, including Eldora Speedway, the famed half-mile dirt track in Ohio, and USAC and World of Outlaw teams that have combined to win nine championships.

The investments and endeavors are there to give Stewart, 37, a prominent place in racing long after his driving career ends. He has shown a knack for being well-organized and, like mentor Joe Gibbs, hiring effective people.

Brett Frood, a former Brown University lacrosse team captain who holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, oversees Stewart's interests, including the business side of Stewart-Haas Racing.

Stewart was able to hire longtime Richard Childress Racing executive Bobby Hutchens as his director of competition and lure Darian Grubb and Tony Gibson away from Hendrick Motorsports and Dale Earnhardt Inc., respectively, for the crew chief posts.

He landed major sponsors Office Depot, Old Spice, Burger King and U.S. Army, while releasing about 20 holdover employees and adding 50 new ones. And, of course, he signed fellow Indiana native Newman to drive the No. 39 Chevy.

"Tony's mind-set is to hire the right people for the right job so he isn't overcommitted," Newman said. "There are people that are overcommitted. There are people that overcommit themselves. But he's done a good of putting people in position to do their job effectively."

Ray Evernham, who recently gave up team ownership after an eight-year run, thinks Stewart might find that delegation works better in theory than practice.

"Whether he puts somebody in charge or not, everybody's going to want to talk to him," Evernham said. "Tony's a guy who cares, so he's not going to be able to turn it off. I think he's going to find he has a lot of people pulling on his pant leg wanting a decision from him, even though he's put somebody in charge."

Stewart insists he understands how his ownership responsibilities could detract from his driving focus. His approach will be to compartmentalize.

"I can't do both roles at the same time," he said. "I can be an owner four days a week, but the other three days, I have to be a driver. That's the only way it will work."