Tony Stewart: The Entrepreneur

The All Stars and Renegades split is over. I am happy a guy like Tony Stewart is willing to step up and help the sport of sprint car racing. You cannot deny his passion for dirt track racing, in particular sprint car racing. To invest so much financially and emotionally, after the year he has had to endure is amazing. Especially when you consider the undertaking this will be and the problems that will come with it. Sure the instant reaction is appreciation and thanks for coming in with your cape and rescuing this situation, but in the long run every racing series has its ups and downs. Where will the point fund come from, what political implications will come from owning a track and a series when it comes to scheduling events, rules, all those sorts of things is where you get your hands dirty.

Tony now owns a World of Outlaws team with Donny Schatz, a secondary team with Steve Kinser, he has backed away from USAC team ownership, owns one of the premier dirt tracks of the world in Eldora Speedway, and now the most legendary 410 sprint car series next to the World of Outlaws. He is without a doubt one of the most powerful and influential people in the dirt track racing today.



It will be interesting to see where the new All Star Series goes from here. I think it will be successful, probably more so than in the past with stable ownership. The brand name of the series carries a lot of weight. There is history there, and as a Historian myself, I can attest that one of the biggest reasons Knoxville Raceway is so successful is because of the historic significance it has with race fans and drivers. The WoO has shown that in the past when the USA and NSL tried to split away. It wasn’t feasible for some tracks to sell an unproven name to their market and fan base. The Indy 500 is the anchor of an entire series and brand of racing. The CART series didn’t understand that back in the 90’s. This is the best possible result for the All Star Series.

I think it is a smart move to change the Florida events to non-point events. So many teams in the Ohio region are weekend warriors who have real jobs during the week. For them to spend a week in Florida is costly to them. I would look for those events to fade away from the All Star schedule next year and maybe someone like a Tommie Estes Jr. can make a 4 or 5 race series out of that Florida deal similar to the Winter Heat shows. The All Star Series will likely become a regional series in Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, and perhaps venture to Michigan or Illinois. I’m not sure it makes sense for them to travel much more than that.

I was at the Chili Bowl a couple of weeks ago and Tony Stewart was helping with track prep this year. His passion to be involved with that event is really cool, but the conspiracy theorist in me thinks there could be more to it. Emmett Hahn and Lanny Edwards aren’t getting any younger, I think both men are in their 70’s. I could see Tony becoming the man who runs that show in the future. I don’t even know how you would put a price tag on a race or event like that, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if Tony is the man to continue the Chili Bowl legacy.

2015 is going to be an interesting season to say the least.