2009 Key Stats

Jul 1 Stewart has a 69-point lead in the standings heading into Daytona for Saturday night's Coke Zero 400. Stewart is a two-time winner of the 400-miler at Daytona -- he won back-to-back in 2005 and 2006. Those are two of his six top-five and 11 top-10 finishes in 21 Daytona starts. He was 20th in last year's 400 and 14th in this year's Daytona 500.
Stewart finished fifth at New Hampshire. "I'm really proud of our guys," Stewart said. "We were just a little bit off, but we had sparks of brilliance during the day where we were really decent. So we can't be too disappointed with that." ... Stewart was happy to see his old car and his old team win the race as 19-year-old Joey Logano became the youngest winner in Cup history. "I'm happy for Zippy (Greg Zipadelli, crew chief, No. 20 car) and Joey and all the guys on that team," said Stewart, who spent 10 years wheeling the No. 20 car before becoming an owner/driver. "You take them any way you can get them. That's as much a strategy as shocks and springs and everything else. They still had to work to get themselves in that position, so they did a good job. It's like I told Joey, I said 10 years down the road, nobody's ever going to know how this win came, but the thing is, they still had to earn it. They did a good job strategy-wise. For them, it makes up for the one we lost here last year because of rain. I'm happy with our run, but proud for those guys, too."
Stewart has talked about adding a third car to his operation next season but said it all comes down to money. "I think right now the biggest thing is you've got to make sure you can fund it first," he said. "You can build a team, but if you don't have the money to run it, it's not going to work. So making sure that you've got proper funding is obviously the biggest thing."
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