<table> </table> TALLADEGA, Ala. | Tony Stewart was in no mood to make any apologies after Sunday&#8217;s Sprint Cup race. He made no effort to explain away a final-lap block he put on a rookie challenger that contributed to a controversial finish to the race.</p><p>The 2008 season has been a killer for Stewart. It&#8217;s been maddening and frustrating, and he let it be known that if people have problems with the way he won the Amp Energy 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, well, those would be their problems.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s just been one of those years that we&#8217;ve just had bad luck all season,&#8221; Stewart said after accepting the winner&#8217;s trophy. &#8220;There were four or five shots we had at winning races this year and something happens at some point. Man, to finally get that first one of the year and to do it at Talladega, people don&#8217;t understand what that means to me.&#8221;</p><p>What some people also did not understand was why Stewart was handed the trophy after he was beaten to the finish line by first-year driver Regan Smith.</p><p>NASCAR officials, however, said Smith had gone below the yellow line at the bottom of the track to make his pass of Stewart for the lead as the two headed toward the checkered flag.</p><p>And that, they said, is illegal.</p><p>&#8220;You cannot improve your position anytime you go below the yellow line,&#8221; NASCAR vice president of corporate communications Jim Hunter said. &#8220;In our judgment, (Smith) improved his position and the penalty for that is a pass through (the pits at pit-road speed) so he was moved back to the tail end of the longest line.&#8221;</p><p>That put Smith 18th on the final box score.</p><p>Smith and some other drivers protested that statement.</p><p>&#8220;The rule is,&#8221; Smith said that he understood, &#8220;that No. 1, anything goes on the last lap. They always tell us that in the drivers&#8217; meeting. They always say, &#8216;On the last lap, it&#8217;s NASCAR&#8217;s discretion.&#8217; &#8221;</p><p>Not exactly, said Jimmie Johnson, who finished ninth and increased his lead in the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship to 72 points over Carl Edwards.</p><p>Johnson said a rumor had spread through the garages that if a driver can see the flagstand, they can go below the yellow line and pass.</p><p>Johnson said the rumor began after people watched Saturday&#8217;s truck series race and there was passing under yellow in that race.</p><p>&#8220;Like wildfire, it went through the garage area,&#8221; Johnson said. &#8220;Everybody was kind of worrying about it but keeping it in their back pocket. That&#8217;s why the question wasn&#8217;t brought up at the drivers&#8217; meeting. I promise you, the next drivers&#8217; meeting we have at restrictor-plate racing, it will be.&#8221;</p><p>Greg Zipadelli, Stewart&#8217;s crew chief, said there is no gray area concerning yellow lines.</p><p>&#8220;I think it has been pretty clear for six or seven years now that if you advance your position below the yellow line, you&#8217;re going to lose your position,&#8221; Zipadelli said. &#8220;I swear to you, we were the first car penalized in the July race at Daytona in, I think, 2002. We finished sixth, and they put us all the way back to last car on the lead lap.&#8221;</p><p>An explanation for why Smith went below the yellow line to make his pass was that when he attempted it above the line, Stewart put a heavy block on him. That can be controversial, but not necessarily illegal. Drivers will often say they did not intentionally use a block.</p><p>Not Stewart. Not Sunday. Not the way he has been crushed by 2008.</p><p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve lost Daytona 500s, I&#8217;ve lost races here at Talladega because somebody blocked,&#8221; he said. &#8220;That&#8217;s the name of the game. The nice thing is, I was actually on the right end of it this time. Trust me, I have no regrets about what I did. I did exactly what I needed to do to win the race.&#8221;</p><p>The victory was more than just a moral victory for Stewart. It may have put him back in contention for a third championship. He moved from 11th to seventh in points and cut into Johnson&#8217;s points lead.</p><p>For a large portion of the race, it looked as if a lot of people would cut into Johnson&#8217;s points lead. He lost contact with the pack early and went a lap down.</p><p>Johnson came back, however, getting back on the lead lap and avoiding trouble the rest of the way &#8212; something that very few of the 12 Chase drivers were able to do Sunday at Talladega.