Tony Stewart competes.

Certainly, he competes every time he’s behind the wheel of a race car, no matter whether it’s a Nextel Cup car on a superspeedway, a sprint racer on a dirt track or a go-kart goofing off with his buddies.

But he competes everywhere else, too. He’s down to 179 pounds thanks to a trainer who’s helping him with an exercise program and watching everything the 2005 Nextel Cup champion consumes.

“I have to do everything full out,” Stewart said. “That’s just the way I am. Everything I agree to do I want to do it the best that I can.”

That’s one reason Stewart will spend the first part of this week in New York City doing “practice” shows in preparation for Thursday night’s preview edition of the weekly Sirius Satellite Radio show he’ll be doing next year.

“This is going to be a huge challenge for me,” said Stewart, whose show co-hosted by television racing analyst Matt Yocum will air for two hours each week on the NASCAR channel that begins full-time on Sirius channel 128 on Jan. 1.

Stewart and Yocum plan to do their first rehearsal show Monday night and will do another Tuesday night. If all goes well, they’ll take Wednesday night off before the preview show airs at 6 p.m. Thursday.

Musician Kid Rock and diet guru Richard Simmons are scheduled to be guests on the first show, along with 2006 Nextel Cup champion Jimmie Johnson. That lineup indicates Stewart’s idea for the show, which will be about more than just racing.

“I want the show to be informative, but foremost I want it to be entertaining,” he said. “We’ll talk about the hot topics of the week in NASCAR, I am sure, but because we’re going to talk about things outside of racing I am going to have to do my homework, too.”

Stewart and Yocum also will take phone calls from fans, and Stewart said he wants the calls to be split fairly evenly between callers who might be his fans and those who might not be.

“That’s something I am really big on,” Stewart said. “I don’t want this to just be a show where people kiss Tony Stewart’s butt. I want this to be a show where fans can ask the questions they normally don’t get to ask. I am sure I will get backed into the corner sometimes, but that’s what will make it entertaining.”

Stewart competes at interviews, too. Sometimes he tries to answer the question he wants to answer instead of the one he’s being asked, and he can be quite good at it. Now, though, the tables are turned.

“I will be on the other side of the mike, so now I have to create the questions and the dialogue and take the phone calls,” he said. “I am a person who likes to be mentally stimulated. It’s going to be fun, I think.”

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