FORT WORTH, Tex. – It was a chipper Tony Stewart who lingered after Thursday night’s Texas Motorsports Hall of Fame dinner, answering questions from reporters and posing for selfies with a succession of admirers.
Unabashedly eager to return to his No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet for his final season in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series racing, Stewart is at the mercy of his doctors, who will run scans on the injured driver at the end of April.
“I feel great,” said Stewart, who suffered a burst fracture of his first lumbar vertebra in an all-terrain vehicle accident in late January. “I’ve been doing everything the last week that I wanted to do… If you step off a curb wrong or you step too hard, you’re definitely reminded that you have these rods in your back.
“Other than that, I feel really well. It’s just a matter of waiting till they… I’m anxious to get the scans. It’s driving me crazy wanting to see what it looks like and then listening to the diagnosis and when they think they’re going to let me go.”
Stewart attended the dinner at Texas Motor Speedway to receive the General Thomas Sadler Award for his work on behalf of Speedway Children’s Charities. Stewart has raised approximately $1.5 million through his annual “Smoke Show” at TMS.
Former driver and current NBC Sports analyst Jeff Burton was the guest of honor as the 2015 inductee into the Hall of Fame. Martin Truex Jr. received the Texas Motor Speedway Sportsmanship Award. Erik Jones was honored as TMS Racer of the Year, and Wood Brothers Racing co-founders Glen and Leonard Wood were added to the rolls of the Bruton Smith Legend Award.
Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.
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