DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Tony Stewart built a Hall of Fame career — and a fiercely loyal following — by racing anything, anytime, anywhere.
From midgets to Indy cars, from sprint cars to stock cars, Stewart was at home behind the wheel. But at 54, with three NASCAR Cup Series championships and 49 wins, he still had something on his racing bucket list.
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On Friday night, he plans to check it off.
Stewart will make his return — and Craftsman Truck Series debut at Daytona International Speedway — in the Florida 250. He’ll add instant star power to an event already featuring urgency and young ambition.
“Smoke,” a nickname earned for Stewart’s ability to burn rubber, still delivers plenty of cachet at a time when NASCAR is pushing for momentum.
“We all know right now NASCAR needs all the help it can get right this minute,” Stewart told the Associated Press. “This is a good way to kind of help with that and get the fans excited about Daytona.”
Excitement will be a given during the 100-lap mad dash featuring up-and-comers pushing to make their name and move up the ranks. This year’s race under the lights also will welcome several established drivers, including two Daytona 500 winners, 2023 champion Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and 2021 winner Michael McDowell.
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“Is it the most ideal race for me to run as a driver? Probably not, in all reality,” said Stewart, who has to qualify starting at 3 p.m. Friday to make the 36-driver field.
But make no mistake: “Smoke” will consume much of the oxygen at Daytona International Speedway.
“I’m excited to watch him,” said Joey Logano, a three-time Cup Series champion. “It’s a huge story.”
Stewart’s talent and aggressive style made him a force of nature at every level of racing.
The only driver to win championships in NASCAR and IndyCar, he also swept USAC’s Midget, Sprint and Silver Crown national titles in 1995 — a feat no one has repeated.
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Lately, Stewart has been piloting a Top Fuel dragster — a challenge even his most accomplished peers consider extraordinary.
“I want to see him go 320 (mph) in a dragster,” Jimmie Johnson told the Orlando Sentinel.
Those same drivers want to see Stewart handle trucks at speeds reaching more than 190 mph in draft-heavy conditions at Daytona — a style of racing that has evolved significantly since he last competed at Daytona.
Stenhouse, who once drove for Stewart in dirt racing as a teenager in 2007, expects fireworks.
“I texted Tony as soon as I saw he was racing and said, ‘Hey, we’re gonna have some fun,’ ” Stenhouse told the Sentinel.
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Stewart won 19 times at the World Center of Racing, including four summer Cup races, but the Daytona 500 eluded him. His inability to capture his sport’s biggest prize in 17 tries haunted Stewart when he retired after the 2016 season.
He has remained close to the sport, even serving as a Fox analyst during the Daytona 500. But Logano, who will be in the broadcast booth Friday night, expects Stewart to discover a different brand of racing.
“He’s gonna realize how much the world has changed since he was here last,” Logano said. “What used to happen on the racetrack compared to what it is now has just changed a lot. The level of aggression, the moves that are made are just different than what they used to be.
“I’m interested to see what he thinks.”
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Few doubt Stewart will share those thoughts. He was as famous for his blunt honesty and fiery confrontations as he was for his wins.
In 2013 at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California, Logano joined Stewart’s list of rivals — a group that once included Jeff Gordon, Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards.
“With Tony you’re either in or out,” Johnson said. “There’s not a middle ground with him.”
For members of the inner cycle, loyalty runs deep.
Johnson first met Stewart in the early 1990s at Ventura Raceway, a high-banked one-fifth-mile clay oval in California. Years later, their careers intertwined during NASCAR’s modern golden era.
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Stewart’s 2005 and 2011 championships bookended Johnson’s record five straight from 2006-10.
While chasing championships, the two drivers bonded amid sponsor tension — Lowe’s backing Johnson’s No. 48 Chevrolet; Home Depot emblazoned on Stewart’s No. 14.
“We always thought it was hilarious,” Johnson recalled. “One of our early conversations was like, ‘Dude, can you believe how much our people hate each other?’ We just laughed about that.”
Stewart’s hard-edge and biting humor made him magnetic. His accomplishments left the younger generation awestruck.
Chase Briscoe fulfilled a dream driving Stewart’s iconic No. 14 for for Stewart-Haas racing before the team shuttered in 2024. When Stewart recently called for advice, Briscoe was initially at a loss for words.
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“In the back of my mind, I’m thinking like, ‘Why are you asking me? You’re in the Hall of Fame, not me,’ ” Briscoe said. “But it was cool. Everybody knows he’s my hero. The fact that he was even asking … it was neat.”
Humility as a first-time father in his 50s have softened the hard-charging Stewart.
“It’s going to be a lot more fun for me to watch my son and see him look at all these bright, shiny colorful trucks,” he said.
But on Friday, Stewart will tap into his fearless competitiveness during a long-awaited return. Amid the chaos of the trucks race will be a 54-year-old legend who never stopped chasing speed.
“It is going to be a wild race that people are going to want to tune into,” Stenhouse said.
