USAC drivers continue to make impact in NASCAR

For the young men and women who race the dirt ovals around this great country, this was a dream-sustaining weekend of racing. Not necessarily for any on-track successes they may have earned, but for watching two of their own win really big races in Indianapolis this weekend.

Of course, one was Tony Stewart, who won his second Allstate 400 at the Brickyard on Sunday. The other was Jason Leffler, who won a hard-fought Kroger 200 Busch Series race at O'Reilly Raceway Park on Saturday night. Both men are former United States Automobile Club (USAC) champions who parlayed impressive dirt-track resumes into solid NASCAR careers.

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Stewart's four USAC championships include a 1994 National Midget Series title and USAC's Triple Crown in 1995: Midget Series, Sprint Car Series and Silver Crown championships all in the same year.

Leffler also has four USAC championships to his credit including three consecutive National Midget Series championships from 1997-99 (the only person ever to accomplish that feat), plus a Silver Crown title in 1998.

But Stewart and Leffler are not alone. NASCAR in general, and the Nextel Cup Series in particular, abounds with USAC champions: Ken Schrader (1982 Silver Crown, 1983 Sprint Car); Dave Blaney (1984 Silver Crown); Jeff Gordon (1990 National Midget, 1991 Silver Crown); Ryan Newman (1999 Silver Crown); and Kasey Kahne (2000 National Midget). Perhaps most impressive of all, J.J. Yeley tops all NASCAR competitors with five USAC championships, including titles in Sprint Car (2001), Silver Crown (2002), and the Triple Crown in 2003.

As it ends up, Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Yeley and Stewart are the only two drivers in USAC history to win the Triple Crown. When you come to grips with how brutally competitive each of these racing series is, and how difficult it is to win a single national championship in any of those series, you get a real appreciation for how remarkable a feat the Triple Crown really is.

Success in USAC, or any other form of racing, is no guarantee of success at the next level. But when you look at the driver traits needed to succeed in USAC, you see a whole lot of what you would like to have in a driver for one of your NASCAR teams, for example:

• Competitive Fire -- As I mentioned, these are ultra-competitive series. The racing is bare-knuckles and not for the meek or the weak. Winning here proves something real about the inner drive of the person behind the wheel.

• Poise -- Or is it bravery? In a series where you're wrangling with an ill-handling (I know that's the wrong term) 1800-pound, open-wheeled beast with 750 some-odd horsepower sideways, on dirt, with wheels practically interlocked with the drivers on the inside and outside of you ... well, let's just say it takes a lot to rattle your cage.

• Versatility -- As the night's racing goes on, tracks change to a greater degree than in any other form of racing. Plus, there's no shortage of racing lines: high, low and everything in between. If you're going to win, you have to know how to exploit every line. You have to know how to go out and find the traction to make a pass and do what it takes inside the car to make the pass stick.

• Raw Talent -- The talent pool at USAC races is deep. Only its cream rises to the top.

As important as those traits are, they are an incomplete list of what it takes to succeed in NASCAR. And certainly, USAC is not alone in its ability to produce NASCAR's next big star. But there is a certain complementary element to USAC racing that makes NASCAR team owners sit up and take notice.

Video: Busch Series

• Leffler gives Toyota first win
• Leffler makes winning pass

NASCAR has a long history of USAC drivers competing and succeeding at its highest levels. Past USAC champions A.J. Foyt, Mario Andretti, Parnelli Jones and Johnny Rutherford have all won NASCAR events. But their forays into NASCAR were all too fleeting.

NASCAR as a career destination for USAC drivers is something of a new development. Traditionally, USAC Sprint or Silver Crown drivers would look to USAC Champ Car or CART and a shot at victory at the Indianapolis 500 as their crowning career achievement.

But with American open-wheel racing's top tier fractured as it is between the IRL and the Champ Car World Series, the path above and beyond USAC now has many of its stars looking to NASCAR. And why not? NASCAR's star is still on the rise and aspiring drivers don't need to bankroll their own rides as so many do in IRL and Champ Car.

Stewart points to another reason. "Jeff Gordon was probably the biggest influence. He had a lot of success in USAC -- won a lot of races. He wasn't just handed an opportunity in NASCAR. He earned his way down there. When he got the opportunity to go to NASCAR, he opened up a lot of opportunities for drivers like myself.

"When Jeff had his success down South, it boosted everybody's spirits and helped show everyone in USAC that it was a reality and that if they had the same kind of results that Jeff had on the track, then it could happen to them too," Stewart said.

For that matter, Stewart's successes in NASCAR have done nothing to dampen spirits of aspiring dirt oval racers, either. Between Stewart and Gordon, their six career victories at the Brickyard may just be enough to make dreams of winning the 400-mile race there as lofty as winning that track's 500-mile race.

The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.