RELATED: Weekend schedule | Dillon ready for action
TALLADEGA, Ala. -- A week after returning to NASCAR Sprint Cup Series competition, Tony Stewart becomes a start-and-park driver.
In a manner of speaking. Start-and-watch might be more appropriate.
The three-time premier series champion missed the season's first eight points races after suffering a back injury during the offseason.
RELATED: Full timeline of Stewart's injury, comeback
Stewart is scheduled to start his No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet in Sunday's GEICO 500 (1 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at Talladega Superspeedway before turning over the wheel to XFINITY Series driver Ty Dillon .
It's an infrequent turn of events, but something that does happen from time to time in NASCAR.
Last season, Erik Jones stepped in for Denny Hamlin at Bristol Motor Speedway after the Joe Gibbs Racing driver developed a neck spasm during a rain delay. Jones finished 26th.
Hamlin was also involved in a driver swap at Talladega in 2013. Injured in an accident at Auto Club Speedway, Hamlin started the Aaron's 499 but eventually gave up the seat to Brian Vickers.
J.J. Yeley replaced Bill Elliott during a race here in 2011; he also replaced Stewart in '08 during the summer race at Daytona.
Stewart, speaking to the media Friday at Talladega, said he expects to do "what I always do around here at the beginning of the race … just ride around in the back until we get to the first caution."
It won't be "glamorous," he said, but it meets his doctors' request. Well, almost. According to Stewart, his doctors didn't want him competing at all this weekend.
"We need the points and so we talked them into letting us to at least start the race," said Stewart, who sits 101 points out of 30th.
MORE: Standings pre-Talladega
"I told them it normally doesn't go more than two or three laps at the beginning of the race before a caution. It might go 82 or 83 laps, who knows? But, we'll run until it gets there."
Unofficially, the last time a relief driver won a NASCAR premier series race was 1977, and it occurred at Talladega as well. Donnie Allison started what was then a July race but eventually turned the driving over to Darrell Waltrip due to illness.
Waltrip replaced Allison with 23 laps remaining and took the lead with six to go when race leader Skip Manning's car suffered mechanical problems.
According to NASCAR rules, points earned by an entry are awarded to the driver starting the race, meaning Stewart will be credited with those earned Sunday by Dillon.