Tony Stewart is the NASCAR equivalent of Formula 1’s Fernando Alonso. After winning three titles in the premier class of stock car racing, Stewart decided that it was time to explore different avenues. His search led him to the NHRA, where he competes in drag racing alongside his wife, Leah Pruett. But here’s the thing. Despite all the success he had in stock car racing, Tony Stewart vouches for the NHRA instead of NASCAR.

Long gone are the days when NASCAR was the sole motorsports entertainment series for the audience. In recent years, the NHRA and the IHRA have doubled down to challenge NASCAR while it’s vulnerable. The NHRA, in particular, is starting to gain a lot of traction with the American audience. Courtesy of the Texas FallNationals, the series was able to beat NASCAR’s viewership numbers last year at Texas with 2.07 million viewers on FOX.

So what exactly makes fans flock towards this screaming, hot, and insanely powerful racing series? For starters, the NHRA excels at sparking curiosity in new fans. Any racing series can only rise to the top as long as they capture a massive audience. With Tony Stewart by their side, the NHRA seems to be doing exactly that.

“In the last two years, fans have come to drag races for the first time, and they will come by and see us, and they’re like, ‘You know, it’s our first time.’ I say, ‘Well, what brought you here?’ They say, ‘You.’ Well, that’s cool, you know, bringing a new group of fans to the racetrack.

“I said, ‘If you have time, come by before you leave and tell me what you thought.’ And they haven’t seen a Nitro car down the racetrack yet, and the number 1 overwhelming response is, ‘We had no idea.’ That’s what four out of five people would say literally, almost word for word: ‘We had no idea.’ And I think it really is a testament to what this sport is truly about.”

The cars Tony Stewart races in the NHRA are among the most extreme in motorsports. The monster of a machine is able to produce nearly 10,000+ horsepower, achieving 0-60 in less than a second. That’s like a fighter jet, except that it is constrained to the ground. So for a new fan, this experience is going to feel out of this world. It is likely a welcome change from the relatively slow pace of NASCAR.

Here, everything is decided before the minute ends, compared to the hours of racing in NASCAR. Moreover, the broadcasters also do an amazing job at relaying the same excitement to the audience tuning in to watch the drag races on their TVs.

“TV does a great job of showing things that you know, like the super slow-moes we have with the cars as fast as they are going. To be able to see these little fine details in the replays is amazing,” the 54-year-old said.

But the biggest secret that NHRA holds is not the abundance of horsepower or the quick acceleration. It is the ability to retain fans with honesty. An average race fan cares more about the experience than the spectacle or the race results. NHRA gives them exactly that. They allow the fans to interact with the teams and drivers and freely explore the pits during the event.

As Stewart remarked, “Get them here one time; get them a good experience that they are going to come back for.”

Now, compare that with the NASCAR experience to which fans are accustomed. There is a lot of chaos over the weekend as they plan their trips without going broke.

There are multiple complaints about the fans being unable to stay comfortably owing to the absurd hotel pricing. Not only that, but fans are also sometimes frustrated with the camping experience on the track over the weekend. All these factors end up accumulating over time to create resentment among the fans. Here’s where NHRA excels.

By exposing them to the raw nature of the sport, NHRA ensures that they get the best bang for their buck. And a happy fan is a loyal fan. While Stewart understands the implications of NHRA for the audience, there is a different and much more drastic experience that he goes through during the weekends.

Tony Stewart admits the brutality of racing Top Fuel dragsters

When a Top Fuel dragster empties gallons of nitromethane to accelerate within seconds, it does things to your body. Many fans report feeling the vibrations of the car running through their bodies and making them shiver in fear and awe. The rumbling of the cars from a distance is no match for the forces at play inside it.

In Tony Stewart’s own words:

“If you’ve got four leaving at the same time, it will literally make your insides, your body, move, and you’re like, ‘Whatever.’ They think that’s a joke, that I am exaggerating. Literally, I got carsick the first time I came here four wide because I literally felt my insides. It made me carsick for the rest of the day. So, it’s just a sensation that there’s no other form of motorsports… ”

Imagine when a NASCAR driver starts saying they got carsick; how dangerous and powerful the car needs to be! And Stewart’s experience in motorsports is no joke. Stewart’s opinion carries weight; as a multi-time NASCAR champion who also won the 2025 NHRA Top Fuel title, his admission of getting carsick underscores just how uniquely brutal these machines are.

The NHRA promises something unique to the fans. So far, it has delivered quite strongly on that promise. What remains is to follow the updates and advancements in the series while NASCAR themselves try to claw back from the rock bottom they’ve hit.