Tony Stewart to miss beginning of Sprint Cup season

Stewart-Haas Racing announced Thursday that three-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart will miss the start of the 2016 Sprint Cup Series season after suffering severe back injuries Sunday in an all-terrain vehicle accident.

According to Stewart-Haas officials, no timetable has been set for Stewart to resume competition, but he is expected to make a full recovery and return to the driver’s seat of his No. 14 Chevrolet this season. No interim driver was named.

The SHR team provided more information about his status Thursday, two days after releasing an initial report about the nature of his injuries. Stewart, 44, was scheduled to begin his final full season in NASCAR’s premier series in the Daytona 500 on Feb. 21 (1 p.m. ET, FOX).

According to the team release, Stewart suffered a burst fracture of his first lumbar (L1) vertebra — the uppermost bone in the lower back — in the Sunday afternoon accident on the West Coast. The incident came one day after the driver attended the Barrett-Jackson collector car auction in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Stewart was evaluated at a local hospital and was awake, alert and able to move all extremities, according to the SHR release. He was flown back to the Charlotte, North Carolina area Tuesday evening and admitted to a local hospital. Stewart underwent surgery Wednesday, according to the team.

Dr. Jerry Punch, a longtime motorsports analyst for ESPN with a degree in medicine, told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio on Thursday afternoon that each case is treated individually when determining a timetable for recovery.

“These kind of burst fractures, bone fragments can penetrate the spinal cord and you can have all kinds of other issues unless you’re lucky, and apparently he was, which we’re all thankful for,” Punch told SiriusXM.

A burst fracture in the spine occurs when an extreme load is placed on the vertebra, causing an immediate and severe compression. The most frequent cause is severe trauma, such as a vehicle accident or a fall from a height.

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Among the races Stewart is expected to miss is the season-opening Daytona 500. Barring a return to premier-series competition after 2016, Stewart will likely finish his elite career 0-for-17 in The Great American Race at Daytona International Speedway, a track where he’s won 19 times — including Daytona 500 qualifying races, the Sprint Unlimited exhibition and two International Race of Champions (IROC) events.

Stewart-Haas Racing did not announce a substitute driver for Stewart’s No. 14 Chevrolet, saying that plans had not been made final. Teams load into Daytona next week, with opening practice for the Sprint Unlimited exhibition beginning Friday, Feb. 12. Clint Bowyer has been tapped as Stewart’s replacement in 2017 after a one-year stint this season with HScott Motorsports.

Stewart announced the timetable for his retirement from NASCAR’s top division last Sept. 30, saying that the time was right to end his full-time driving duties. Stewart left open the likelihood of competing in other series and events, continuing his history of extracurricular racing on both asphalt and dirt.

“It was a choice that is 100 percent mine, no pressure from anybody,” Stewart said of his decision not to step away from the circuit. “If anything, it’s been the opposite, more people trying to talk me out of it. Everyone in their career makes a decision when it’s time for a change. I think deep down you know when it’s time to do something different and make a change like this.”

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Stewart claimed championships in 2002, 2005 and 2011. His most recent crown came in a stirring charge through the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup playoffs with five wins — including a decisive one in the season finale — to secure his third title in a tiebreaker with Carl Edwards. But Stewart’s performance the last three seasons — complicated by health and personal setbacks — has notably tapered off.

Stewart missed significant parts of the 2013 and 2014 seasons after accidents in sprint-car competition. In 2013, the Indiana native sat out the final 15 races of the Sprint Cup season after suffering severe leg fractures in a crash at a dirt track in Oskaloosa, Iowa. The following year, Stewart skipped three premier-series races after his involvement in an on-track incident that took the life of 20-year-old racer Kevin Ward Jr. at a dirt oval in New York.

Stewart competed the entire 2015 campaign, but wound up 28th in the overall driver standings with just three top-10 finishes in 36 races. He entered this season with a new crew chief in Mike Bugarewicz and high hopes for improvement in adapting to a new reduced-downforce aerodynamic rules package.

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Regardless of his status for 2016, Stewart has built a racing resume with credentials that will certainly make him a lock for speedy induction into the NASCAR Hall of Fame when eligible. Besides being a champion three times over, Stewart has amassed 48 victories in NASCAR’s premier series, including two in the prestigious Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in his home state.

Stewart entered the world of stock-car racing in 1999 with a long-term association with Coach Joe Gibbs’ team, an affiliation that ended one year after that team shifted its manufacturer allegiance to Toyota. In 2009, Stewart entered a partnership with businessman Gene Haas to create a new Chevrolet team in Stewart-Haas Racing, an organization that has grown from a two-car outfit to a four-car operation.

Stewart has also endeared himself to fans with his swashbuckling, no-nonsense style, his ability to excel in various forms of motorsports and his connection to the sport’s home-grown roots. As owner of historic Eldora Speedway in rural Western Ohio, Stewart helped NASCAR return to its dirt-track heritage in 2013 by hosting a successful Camping World Truck Series event, now entering its fourth season.

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