AVONDALE, Ariz. -- Carl Edwards has had a great year.

Seriously, folks. He has.

He married Kate Downey in January, and now the couple is happily expecting their first child. That's the important stuff in life.

So what if Edwards has yet to win a Sprint Cup race, with time fast running out on the 2009 season in which he was considered by many as the pre-season favorite to challenge Jimmie Johnson for the championship? So what if Edwards had to suffer through what he jokingly now calls "the agony of de feet" after suffering a broken foot while throwing Frisbee, of all things? So what if he looked like he was going to win the spring race at Talladega and he nearly ended up in the frontstretch grandstands instead?

Edwards said Friday at Phoenix International Raceway that he feels blessed, and he certainly seems happy. He said he's gained a greater perspective on life, and on racing.

"I do my absolute best every time I climb into a race car. If I do that and it isn't good enough, I can still live with the results," Edwards.

That isn't to say that Edwards doesn't get frustrated, disappointed and/or downright ticked off at times -- or sometimes all at once in a tangled web of emotions. But when he has a moment to sit back and think about it all in the grand scheme of life, he said he's better able to cope with it and figure out what he might be able to do to improve even a dire situation.

This time last year, Edwards was locked into a two-man battle with Johnson in the Chase for the Sprint Cup. And although it was almost a foregone conclusion that Johnson would win his third consecutive title -- he held a 106-point lead on Edwards heading into the Phoenix race last fall -- it was Edwards and not Johnson who was the hottest driver in NASCAR at the time.

He entered Phoenix having owned the two previous races and eight overall for the season. He made it a series-high nine by capturing the season finale at Homestead a week later. Winning seemed, well, almost easy for Edwards in his No. 99 Ford.

But it didn't carry over to the 2009 Cup season. Remarkably, he has yet to win a single Cup race this year.

"If winning bred winning, we'd have won plenty this year. We were so good last season. But it doesn't really work like that," Edwards said. "You show up at the race track -- and first of all, you have to be fast enough to win. Otherwise, you can't really plan on winning. Then if you're fast enough to win, things have to go your way. If they go your way, you might win."

There has been a fundamental flaw for Edwards and his No. 99 team in the equation this season.

"So far this season we just haven't had a lot of races where we were fast enough to win," he said.

There were times when he thought they were -- like at Texas in the spring or the first Martinsville race, when "troubles on pit road" ruined his chances late. But he said the real problem is that the car just hasn't been fast enough most races.

"The difference between this season and last season is instead of one out of 10 races where we're fast enough to win as we are this season, last season I felt it was like eight out of 10 races we were fast enough to win," Edwards said. "So, we just have to be better. And that's what we've been working on."

Edwards also has had the Nationwide Series on which to fall back. Although that series title was all but sewn up by Kyle Busch by Saturday's race in Phoenix, Edwards, the defending Nationwide champion, was second in points in a season that has included a series-high six poles and four victories.

Unlike most of his Cup contemporaries, who find the grind of running both a full-time schedule in Cup and Nationwide too much for their liking, Edwards said Friday that he enjoys it so much that he plans to do it for at least another two years. The only other driver who has announced plans to run both series full time next season is Brad Keselowski, who entered Saturday's Phoenix race third in Nationwide points behind only Busch and Edwards.

"That's my plan right now. That could change, but I enjoy it," Edwards said. "It seems like a grind when you're not running well. When I watch that 18 car [of Busch] just motor by, those days aren't any fun -- but Montreal was a blast, ORP [O'Reilly Raceway Park just outside Indianapolis] was a blast, this [Phoenix] race in the spring.

"That's why I do it. When we're running really well, racing hard ... and especially the times I'm leading, that's the most enjoyable part of the job, and that's good. So as long as we're winning races and able to compete for the championship, I'd like to keep doing this [on the Nationwide side]. It doesn't seem like too much of a grind.

"On Friday, sometimes, there's a lot of running back and forth. If I could just show up for 30 minutes and then race on Saturday, then it would be the perfect situation. That is an idea I had for the Cup drivers -- that we should be allotted only a small bit of [Nationwide] practice. I think that would help the series and it would save us some time."

If there is one thing Edwards has learned this season, he admitted, it's that past success doesn't guarantee a bright future. So while he hopes next season to be racing for championships late into the season in both the Sprint Cup and Nationwide series, he knows nothing is certain.

"You can't rely on your past performances," Edwards said. "You have to keep building and going forward. I think that's what took a real shift in thinking [for us] to get back on track like that. Now we are, and I feel like we are gaining, but we've got to keep working like this throughout the winter."

Meanwhile, life is good for Edwards. No, check that. Life is great.

"It really is. I've come to realize that," a smiling Edwards said.

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