Stewart looks for boost in New Hampshire

LOUDON, N.H. -- With eight races to go until the start of NASCAR's Chase for the Nextel Cup championship, Tony Stewart is looking for some security.

Only the top 10 in the points and anyone else within 400 points of the leader after the Sept. 9 race at Richmond will be eligible to race for the title. Stewart goes into today's Lenox Industrial Tools 300 seventh in the standings.

But the two-time and defending Cup champion isn't comfortable with the situation.

While Stewart is only 53 points behind fourth-place Jeff Burton in the tight race for the Chase, he is 377 behind leader Jimmie Johnson and only 102 points in front of 11th-place Greg Biffle.

"We have some work to do," Stewart said. "We haven't had the consistency we need to have to make sure we get where we want to be."

What Stewart wants most is to recapture the feeling he had when he arrived at New Hampshire International Speedway a year ago.

"We just knew when we got to the track every week that we were going to run well and had a good shot at a win," said Stewart, whose victory here last July was part of a string of 13 consecutive top-10 finishes.

Things haven't been going quite as well for Stewart this season.

Since running off five straight finishes of sixth or better, Stewart has struggled in the last eight races. During that time, he has crashed and broken his right shoulder blade, had mechanical and tire problems and, last Sunday at Chicagoland Speedway, ran out of gas on the final restart and wound up 32nd after running in the top 10 most of the day.

Stewart's only finishes better than 12th during that recent stretch have been a third last month at Pocono and a win two weeks ago in Daytona.

He couldn't be happier to have New Hampshire pop up on the schedule right when he needs a boost.

Last year, Stewart won the July race and finished second here in the fall, leading 405 of 600 laps on the 1-mile oval. But he knows success on the tricky track is no given.

"Obviously, I like [New Hampshire] because I've had success here," Stewart said. "But at the same time, it's a tough track to pass on. You can be a couple of tenths [of a second] faster than a guy, but it still takes you 20 laps to get by him.

"But when you've got a good car, it's always fun to race."

Among those trying to chase down 10th-place driver, Jeff Gordon, in the standings are Biffle, last year's series runner-up; rookie Denny Hamlin; former Cup champion Kurt Busch and Carl Edwards.

Edwards, who finished third last season in the standings, is coming off finishes of 39th at Daytona and 20th at Chicago, and has fallen 193 points out of 10th place. Another bad day and he could be all but eliminated from Chase contention.

"It is imperative for our team to run well this weekend," Edwards said. "The last couple of weeks have been tough on us in regards to the point standings. If we can come out of Loudon with a good finish, we should be able to gain back a few of the points we lost in Daytona and Chicago."