INDIANAPOLIS -- The list of winners at NASCAR's second most prominent event on the schedule is short -- only nine different drivers have won the Brickyard 400 since its inception in 1994.

So what does that tell you?

"There are no slouches that win at the Brickyard," said Tony Stewart, a two-time winner of the famed race in his home state of Indiana in 2005 and 2007.

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It's just one of those facilities that you're not going to back into it and win it on track position, you have to have a good car here. Whoever wins it, it's not going to be a guy that stayed out and tried to get track position and win it with the way the track is shaped. You can't back into it here. You have to earn it.

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-- TONY STEWART

When Cup Series drivers talk about Indianapolis Motor Speedway, words like difficult, technical and demanding are used. It's by far the hardest track to figure out because of the seemingly same but very different corners, long straightaways and inability to make clean passes. Fuel mileage is a factor, as well as the high heat and tire wear.

"It's just one of those facilities that you're not going to back into it and win it on track position, you have to have a good car here," Stewart said. "This track always provided an avenue for the cream to rise to the top every time. Whoever wins it, it's not going to be a guy that stayed out and tried to get track position and win it with the way the track is shaped. You can't back into it here. You have to earn it."

And the drivers who have earned it and made the impressive list -- Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, Dale Jarrett, Bobby Labonte, Bill Elliott and Jimmie Johnson -- are all drivers with Cup championships to their names. Retired driver Ricky Rudd and current points leader Kevin Harvick are also Brickyard winners.

Harvick, who won the Brickyard 400 in 2003, is without a Cup championship, but still said the win was a huge career-changing accomplishment for him.

"I think when you go back and look at how people have won the race, you don't see many surprise winners here," he said. "Usually guys that are fast in that particular season are fast here and one of those guys that's a player during the year winds up winning this race.

"It's not like a speedway race where you can have somebody just sneak up there and do some crazy strategy and have something weird happen. It seems like it's pretty straight forward as far as who is running good in that particular year usually wins this race."

Johnson, a three-time Brickyard winner and four-time Cup champion, makes the same argument and explains that wins in Indianapolis aren't random or by luck, the track is simply to complex.

What makes the 2.5-mile oval built nearly 100 years ago such a menacing place?

"The track is very line specific and very technique specific from the driver's standpoint. Most tracks we have a lot of room," Johnson explained. "If you miss your marks a little bit you can go up the race track and find a way to carry momentum and keep going here."

But here the corners are crucial and there's a very small window to work within and an even smaller margin for error.

"You can make mistakes, but it's just a matter of when they happen," Stewart said. "If you make a mistake early or after a caution and you're packed up then you can lose a lot of spots in a short amount of time. A lot of it is opportunity here and when things happen as far as how you get breaks that go your way or against you."

Johnson said mistakes are usually made in corners.

"We see a lot of guys get on the outside fence," Johnson said. "It's just because they made a bad decision at the start of the turn. What happens at the start of the turn determines your arc and where you'll end up on the corner exit. You think it looks similar and all corners would drive the same or one half would drive similar to the other half. That's not the case. All four corners take a little different technique."

So it's evident by the list of winners, the drivers who have gone on to kiss the bricks certainly garner deserved attention and accolades.

"When you win a race here, you've earned it," Johnson said. "If you win this race, you've earned every inch of it for 400 miles and put yourself in a position to win."