How do you like your driver, shaken, not stirred?

NASCAR has always been known for it's drivers different and sometimes wild personalities. It's a sport where you don't tend to grow up with a favorite already chosen like team sports from your state or city. Instead you pick them because of who they are. For me it was Tony Stewart, and it always will be. I'm not even sure when I picked him because for me it seems like I've been his fan since I was a kid, but I was hardly a kid when he broke in to the top series in 99. So it must have been from the start. I liked that he wasn't happy to lose, that he didn't mind showing who he did and did not like, especially Jeff Gordon. And of course I liked that he was good, and his car wasn't ugly.

As he has gotten older, hes gotten a bit nicer. During a rain delayed race recently, not sure which cause there have been a few, he actually said it was nice working with Gordon. I almost did a double take. True he has to sort of say this because they share Hendrick's engines and such, and he probably does get along with him for on the track kind of things. To me though they seem like total opposites, and I wonder now if things are getting to the point of, be nice to most, or suffer alone.

All sports come down to money, and for NASCAR, this affects the stars more than any other sport. They pitch the products on their car even if they may never have used whatever it is before they got the sponsor. Their fellow teammate drivers they didn't pick, and they don't really do much with on the track, but they have to be friends with so they don't lose their ride with the team. For Stewart, he now owns his team, so he has to be nice to everyone that he needs something from, like Hendrick's engines.

Eventually I think these things tend to suck the life out of a driver. They start realizing that being themselves might get them fans early on. Sort of make a name for themselves, but if they want to stick around and advance through the ranks, they have to do things like the rest of us. Kiss their bosses ass, work with people they might not like, and pretend to like their job. Otherwise they might end up like Robby Gordon.