Tony Stewart stands in the garage area after a practice session for Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup Series auto race at Watkins Glen International, in Watkins Glen N.Y. Stewart struck and killed Kevin Ward Jr., 20, a sprint car driver who had climbed from his car and was on the track trying to confront Stewart during a race at Canandaigua Motorsports Park in upstate New York on Saturday night. Ontario County Sheriff Philip Povero said his department's investigation is not criminal and that Stewart was "fully cooperative" and appeared "very upset" over what had happened.

Tony Stewart had kissed the bricks at Indy and could have jetted off to any vacation destination.

Or he could have headed home for a night of rest.

Instead, a little more than 24 hours after winning the Brickyard 400, Stewart traveled to Iowa to watch sprint car races.

But when some fans noticed the driver nicknamed Smoke, they began heckling him for hanging around the track on a Monday night.

Sprint car driver Terry McCarl grabbed a microphone.

“This guy just won the Brickyard yesterday,” McCarl says he told the crowd. “He could be in Hawaii today with a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader and instead, he’s at Oskaloosa, Iowa, at a dirt track race.”

The fans erupted in cheers.

Stewart has long been one of the most proficient drivers in racing, winning in every kind of series, from sprint cars to NASCAR’s elite Sprint Cup Series. His passion for grassroots racing earned him respect as a true racer.

“It’s obvious he’s a very wealthy man. He doesn’t have to do it,” said McCarl, a dirt track racer since 1985.

Stewart squeezes in all these little races in nondescript towns around the NASCAR schedule because he loves the thrill of the high horsepower, lightweight cars, wheezing and skidding around the dirt.

He rarely made his schedule public.

But his dirt racing career is on hold, and he could still face criminal charges for hitting and killing Kevin Ward Jr. on Saturday night in a sprint car race.

Stewart, who has not announced if he’ll race in Sunday’s NASCAR event at Michigan, dropped out of Saturday’s Bob Newton Classic at Plymouth Speedway in Indiana.

Stewart had committed to race Plymouth this year because the track is in his home state and because of his relationship with the Newton family.

“He hasn’t forgotten where he came from,” track general manager Mike Zielinski said. “He’s totally different here than the way he is on the track. He likes kidding around.”

Stewart was the envy of NASCAR drivers for his ability to run sprint cars as often as he liked. He calls his own shots as the boss in Stewart-Haas Racing and isn’t bound to sit out because of the wishes of others.

NASCAR drivers Kyle Larson, Kasey Kahne and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. are frequent sprint car participants. Clint Bowyer owns a dirt team.

All have contracts, though, that limit their participation.