American Racing News Vol 1, Issue 2 Issue 8 | Page 27

in a season with some-90 points
races. Collectively, his consistent
success throughout the rigor of
one of the most premier
national tours led to a dominant
314-point spread in the series’
points race. With the points
lead, Schatz officially captured
his eighth series championship;
Schatz has won a championship
in 40 percent of his seasons with
the Outlaws.
“I know fans would have loved
to see it go down to the wire,”
said Schatz about his
championship campaign. “It’s
hard to say in this sport when
you take 92 events coast-tocoast you have during the
season. We left Florida to start
this season 100-plus points in
the hole. We had to win. We
dug out of that hole –a 100point deficit to a 300-point
deposit with four DNFs along
the way. To me, it was one of
the hardest fought comebacks
that we’ve had, and I’m really
proud of my guys for that. After

that, it says there’s nothing my
guys can’t do.”
Like Schatz alluded to, he and
his Tony Stewart Racing team
encountered adversity at
DIRTcar Nationals at Volusia
Speedway Park. Though he
captured his first win of the
season on the second night of
the three-day event, Schatz did
not make the feature in the
opener and concluded the event
placing outside of the top 10.
For the reigning series
champion, who won 31 races in
2015, he felt the pressure earlyon.
“On paper, we won a lot of
races and had no DNFs,” said
Schatz recollecting on 2015.
“The hardest thing you can ever
do is come out of a hole. We
came out of that hole, and had
consistent top-five and topthree finishes. But, there were
also some things we left on the
table. We left a championship
out of Knoxville [Nationals], but