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Gloves come off as Cup championship bout nears
Stewart says he'll do anything to hoist the trophy; Edwards is ready to rumble
By David Caraviello, NASCAR.COM
MIAMI BEACH, Fla. -- Long ago, this capital of neon hotel facades and clicking high heels was a haven for power and brute force. For a little while during the 1960s Miami Beach emerged as one of the boxing hubs of America, a place where fighters trained in little gyms far from the sun and the sand, and the convention center became the scene of championship bouts. Cassius Clay fought Sonny Liston for the first time here in 1964, preparing down at the Fifth Street Gym and then shocking the seemingly invincible heavyweight champion before changing his name to Muhammad Ali.
To the old-timers who knew Miami Beach then as now, what happened Thursday afternoon under a tent at beachside Lummus Park might have felt very familiar. Carl Edwards and Tony Stewart met the media in their last big appearance before a Sunday's race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, which will determine which of them will win the Sprint Cup championship, and an old-fashioned heavyweight weigh-in broke out -- complete with posturing, trash talk, and a few jabs thrown here and there. All that was missing was Jackie Gleason broadcasting live from the Fillmore theatre, and Frank Sinatra singing over at the Miramar Hotel.
“
I'll wreck your mom to win a championship. I respect [Edwards] as a driver, but this isn't about friendships this weekend. This is a war.
”
-- TONY STEWART “
He's got the talking part figured out. Problem is, you haven't led the points yet this year, have you?
”
-- CARL EDWARDS
To this point they've been nothing but respectful of one another on and off the race track, with Edwards holding a three-point edge in the championship race, and Stewart winning four times over the course of the playoff to keep it close. There were challenges and needles, for certain, but for the most part they went out of their way to talk about how much they admired one another as drivers and competitors. Thursday, though, with the championship race approaching and both contenders seated on a stage with all lights focused on them, the gloves finally came off.
How far would Stewart be willing to go to secure his third series title? "I'd wreck my mom to win a championship," he said. "I'll wreck your mom to win a championship. I respect [Edwards] as a driver, but this isn't about friendships this weekend. This is a war. This is a battle. This is for a national championship. It's no holds barred this weekend. I didn't come this far to be one step away from it and let it slip away, so we're going to go for it."
Edwards did his best to remain unruffled. "Did you say something?"
And that's the way it went, back and forth, the two trading verbal punches as if the press conference was overseen by Don King. "You can come visit my trophy in the room at Vegas when you come out there," Stewart said, referring to the season-ending championship banquet. Body blow!
"He's got the talking part figured out," Edwards responded. "Problem is, you haven't led the points yet this year, have you?" Right cross!
Actually, Stewart did lead the points twice, once after Las Vegas in March -- ironically, Edwards' only victory this season -- and after the New Hampshire Chase race, the second of his four playoff wins. Not that any of that mattered Thursday. "They say there's talkers and doers. I've done this twice," replied Stewart, the champion of NASCAR's premier series in 2002 and 2005. Edwards is still searching for his first crown.
"That's the funny thing," Edwards shot back. "I've listened to you talk a lot today. You've talked a lot about your past successes. That is very respectable. And truly, all joking aside, that will make it more fun if we're able to beat you. It will make me more proud. But this is going to be a good competition, you guys. Don't think for a second that either one of us are going to let anything slide. We're going to go out here, we're going to race hard, and we're going for this championship. I don't think you could find two harder racers than us up here and we both know that about each other."
These two respect one another too much for all that to be genuine -- right? At times Thursday, it was difficult to tell, as Stewart mixed compliments with pronouncements that nothing would stand in his way on the race track, and Edwards did his best to act like it was any other week in the season. The drivers displayed a contrast in approaches, with Edwards trying to stay above it all ("I don't really have any nerves ... I'm excited to have this opportunity," he said), and Stewart hammering away at the somewhat-stretched notion that he has absolutely nothing to lose, as opposed to the driver he'll be racing against. All other drivers have been eliminated from the championship race, and the worst either of the contenders can finish is second in the final standings.
"We can't go backwards," Stewart said. "We can't lose anything. Literally, we cannot lose anything. ... He can lose the point lead. We don't have it. We don't have anything to lose. All we have is something to gain. He's in a position where he can lose something right now. We have everything to lose and nothing to gain. It's a good position to be in. If we were 20 points out, it would be a different feeling. But we're three points out. We're right there. It doesn't matter what happens on Sunday. We can blow a motor on the pace lap and still not be any worse than we are sitting here today. We have everything to gain and nothing to lose."
Edwards hears all that and shakes his head. Watch: 'No holds barred this weekend'
"I'm not really buying it," he said. "I mean, he does have two trophies already at home. That's a huge accomplishment. But I believe that Tony as an owner and as a competitor, I mean, if you're asking me to believe that he doesn't go to bed thinking, man, I want to win this thing as bad as anyone, I don't believe that. I think for me it would be maybe a bigger accomplishment just because I do not have a championship in the Sprint Cup Series. But I think we're both competitors, we both have that same desire to win, that same amount of pressure that comes with that, just to go out and perform. Bad thing for both of us, the good thing for both of us at the same time, is we both seem to be able to go perform under that pressure. I truly believe this could come down to who wins this race is going to win this championship."
Make it your Mission It certainly shapes up that way, given how well both drivers have been running in recent weeks, and that only a victory will secure the championship for either of them regardless of what the other does. From a mental standpoint, Stewart tried all he could Thursday to give himself an edge. "We were parked right beside [Edwards] last week," he said, referring to last weekend's race at Phoenix. "I see what he looks like, I see what his guys look like, and I see what our guys look like, and I know how I feel about it. It's two different demeanors in the garage right now."
And yet, Edwards finished a spot ahead of Stewart in that event, allowing him to take the points lead to Miami. As cutting as some of the comments could be, and as eyebrow-raising as some of Stewart's pronouncements were Thursday, Edwards dismisses it all as just talk. In truth, the two drivers have never really had an issue with one another, and the two Midwesterners share a passion for dirt racing. But they've never had a championship between them, either.
"Truly, all that stuff is in fun," Edwards said. "I know, and he knows, it doesn't matter what we say here. It doesn't matter if we're over there fighting in the corner before this thing starts. We're race car drivers, and I think we're both good enough, and we're going to go out there and do our jobs, whether we love each other or hate each other. It's kind of beat to be able to go back and forth, and give each other a hard time, and know that it's all just really for [the media] and for fun, because that race is going to be tough, and we're going to have to give it all we've got."
But wrecking the other to win the title, a move that would stand in stark contrast to how the two have raced one another to this point? "I don't know if I believe that," Edwards said. But: "You just never know. You don't know what's going to happen in a race. You don't know how it's going to work out. I'm not about to tell him what I'm about to do, or what lengths I'm willing to go to. It doesn't help me to tell him my strategy. He has stated what he's willing to do, and that's fine. But we would be foolish, either one of us, to underestimate the other's resolve to win. I think that would be foolish."
Truth be told, Stewart may be trying to plant just enough of a seed that Edwards has doubts if he sees the No. 14 car in his rearview mirror. After all, Denny Hamlin seemed to come unglued somewhat under relentless mental pressure from Jimmie Johnson heading into last year's finale, where Hamlin blew a 15-point lead on the final day of the season and Johnson claimed his fifth consecutive title. Edwards, who has been through two close championship campaigns before, doesn't seem willing to concede anything. Then again, neither does Stewart, on the race track or off.
"We respect each other. But this isn't about respecting each other, it isn't about being buddies, or anything like that," Stewart said. "This is about going out and winning a championship this weekend. I'm not worried about everybody else's perceptions. I'm just saying what my intentions are and how I intend to go do it, and it is what it is."
Friday, the focus at last shifts back to the race track. Saturday, the field qualifies for starting positions. Sunday at 3 p.m. local time, the bell rings. Let's get ready to rumble.
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