Stewart not ruling out Indy return

Former IRL champion Stewart never won IndyCar's showpiece race before he switched to stock cars.

He came back to compete in the 1999 and 2001 events while still racing in NASCAR but timing differences between the Coca Cola 600 and the Indy 500 means that it is now impossible to dovetail the two events on the same day.

"This topic comes up every year at this time," Stewart said. "The answer is always the same.  You can almost look at everybody's notes from last year and get the same thing that I'm going to give you right now.

"Yes, I miss being in an IndyCar. Trust me, I'll be at the Speedway during the month of May when I have days off just hanging out and having fun seeing people that I used to race with there.

"But I don't know.  I mean, with my age now, the earliest that I could be back in an IndyCar would be 2010. I'll be almost 40 years old by then.

"It's hard when you're not around that to go every week to get caught up. Every year that goes by, it just seems like that's a part of my career that is kind of like a chapter in a book that seems like it's closed and we've moved on to another chapter.

"I would honestly say I doubt you'll ever see me in an IndyCar again.  But I've learned to never say never also."