Stewart hails 'perfect season'

Stewart's first title in 2002 was clouded by several high-tempered spats, including punching a photographer.

However this season Stewart's route to the title was rather more savoury, winning five races in seven starts during the summer and capturing the title after finishing 15th in the Ford 400 at Homestead Motor Speedway this weekend.

Stewart's victory included his first win at Daytona in the Pepsi 400; winning at his home track of Indianapolis; and securing a clean-sweep of road course races.

"I don't know how we could ask for a better year than we have had this year," Stewart said. "I'm just so excited, so I'm happy getting Zippy [crew-chief Greg Zipadelli] the title the right way and it was a nice way to get it done tonight.

"We were just trying to get the balance right all night. We only made small changes and we could have been more aggressive. But we had out minds on the big prize tonight.

"I've put the team through a lot of hell in the last few years, but they have never given up on me. I had a team talk at the end of the year, just to see if I was going to stay with the team and have a heart to heart to everyone.

"It was pretty hard because we weren't exactly where we needed to be at the start of the year, but we tested at Michigan and then finished second there to [Greg] Biffle and everything clicked after that.

"There was the Daytona win and then the road course wins and we started putting together all these good finishes."