iNSIDE SCOOP: Do What You Love

Tony Stewart got back in a sprint car last week, for the first time since he was injured in one.

I knew when I saw he was doing it that there would be the inevitable "Why is he doing this? Doesn't he know that it's dangerous? Doesn't he know he could be hurt again?"

Let's take those one at a time.

Yeah, he knows it's dangerous.Duh. It's why auto racing is one of the real sports, with bull-riding, mountain climbing and other extreme stuff.You can die doing it.

He knows he can be hurt. All that has to happen is a weather front rolling in and he feels the ache. On a positive note, he has a career as a weatherman when he climbs out of the car for the last time, flings the steering wheel on the dash and says, "Sayonara, y'all." That's not what he'll say, but it's what I can print.

All kidding aside, why does he do it? He does it because it's what he does.

I write for a living. It's what I do. I was good at it early in life and got better, and I'm still not done yet. Tony Stewart was in a race car (kart, actually) at an early age, and he was good at it. He's gotten better. He's still not done.

He doesn't play golf, is not a farmer (though he does live on a farm of sorts) and last I checked didn't collect stamps or belt buckles or anything like that.He plays poker, fools around with RC cars and stuff, buys the odd collector car and likes the Dairy Queen drive-thru when he's to home.

He races. He does other stuff, but racing is what gets him through the week.

He has his own fleet of sprint cars and midgets and late models, and he races them whenever he can.

He's a different guy at Paducah or Eldora than he is at Pocono or Richmond. Less edgy and ornery (and I say that with fondness, for he can be a bear when he wants to be), more willing to be one of the guys.

All the trappings of what he does on Sundays sort of don't sit well with him, in my opinion. He's the rare star who just wants to be who he is and live by his own rules, and if you get in the way of that, you'll find out sooner rather than later.

Why did he get back in the sprint car, less than a year after being nearly maimed in one?

All a racing driver has is his nerve and his confidence to go with the skill he displays in the cockpit. Racing cars is not something everyone can do. I'd love to be able to do it for a living, but I was smart. I didn't have money (neither did Smoke, for that matter) and I couldn't win or finish well enough to make a living at it. So I chose a different path. Doesn't mean I wouldn't jump at the chance to do it, but I'd wind up in a hospital or worse.

If the horse throws you, you have to get back on. That's it. Take not counsel of your fears, and all that. Plus, getting hurt in a sprint car made him and Jimmy Carr and the open-wheel guys around him take a look at some aspects of the drive tube that could benefit others.

Sprint cars are not like the cars you and I drive. It's a seat, a steering wheel, two pedals (go and stop), an in-out box for the transmission and the drive shaft, which is spinning between your feet.

Keeping it there, rather than having it bang around the cockpit with you, is a worthwhile pursuit.

To recap: he got back in the car because that's what he does, what he's happy doing and in order to do it and be happy, he has to get back in.

Sounds pretty simple, at least to me.