Ryan Newman had his optimism tested, but it looks like it passed.

One week, Newman is in a crash that looked like it could have injured him. The next week, he felt like hurting something, himself, after a thin piece of material came off of somebody else's windshield and threatened to blow up his engine.

	Ryan Newman bounced back from a tough start to post a seventh-place finish at Las Vegas.

"It's frustrating," he said earlier this season. "You definitely need to have a strong stomach, because things can make you sick sometimes."

It looked like Newman was experience another stomach-wrenching moment last Sunday, too.

Newman lined up to start the UAW-DiamlerChrystler 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with vindication on mind. Two weeks before, the rear wheel -- axle and all -- came off his No. 12 Dodge and sent his car flipping through the infield at Daytona International Speedway. His car was a mangled mess and the speedway audience feared Newman might be, too.

Fortunately, with a little help from the emergency crew, he climbed out of his car -- which had come to a stop on its roof -- and waved to the crowd. Remarkably, he was uninjured. Not so surprisingly, the ultra-competitive 25-year-old was furious because the wreck relegated him to a last-place finish.

So he showed up to Vegas hoping for better luck. Initially, he wouldn't get it.

"We (had to come) in the pits after somebody's wind shield tear-off landed smack square on our grille and the water was about 270 (degrees)," Newman said of the incident early in the event, which would have caused his engine to overheat if he did not pitted. "We had to come in and take that off. We went back out and we were two laps down."

Three miles, that is, behind the leader.

It appeared Newman's luck was not going to get any better in this, the third race of the season. He should just parade around the track, try to get a respectable finish and collect as many points as possible, right?

Nah. Not if you're Newman. Not if you've been groomed since the age of four to become a racer.

He raced with fellow lapped cars. He raced with lead-lap cars. He raced whatever machine was closest. And when he passed that car, he set his sights on his next victim.

Newman didn't care if the race went green the entire way -- a prospect which would have made it nearly impossible for him to make up any laps -- he was going to race for the heck of it. After all, team owner Roger Penske has gone through an awful lot of trouble to give him a good car and solid team.

"He refused to give up," Newman's crew chief Matt Borland said. "The entire team was amazing. We just kept chasing after it all day and it turned out pretty good for us."

Pretty good is an understatement.

Newman found his way toward the front of pack -- albeit he was riding two laps down while other cars around him were on the lead lap. Then, a caution came out. He zipped past the leader before the two crossed the start/finish line and just like that, one lap was recovered.

Newman started again in the back of the field, this time just one lap back. Once again, he raced his way all the way back to the front. But twice cautions would come out and twice the leader would deny Newman's attempt to pass him -- keeping the sophomore lapped.

"We were so close there that one time," he said, recalling the second of those unsuccessful attempts to get back on the lead lap. "(Race leader Dale Earnhardt) Jr. got away from me and he beat us back to the line by about a foot. I thought that was going to be the last caution."

But Newman had come all this way. Why give up? He figured he'd keep racing. You know, for the heck of it.

Suddenly, a car got loose in the middle of the field and sent some other cars -- including Newman's teammate Rusty Wallace -- spinning. A caution came out and ol' lead foot Newman darted past Junior to get back on the lead lap.

He had kept plugging away and plugging away. He had started the day with a car that was ornery and loose. Then, his engine almost overheated. But after patiently and strategically plotting a path back into contention, Newman was riding a fast car. In fact, he was riding in the fastest car.

"Unfortunately it was a 400-mile race, and we ran out of laps and time," he said. "At the end of the race we were a good half second faster per lap than the leader and most of the top cars. We were definitely the car to beat at the end. We just weren't in the position to beat everybody.

"To be able to fight back like that says a lot about the team and how we fought back together. To come from two laps down at a place like this -- boy, we earned them, too."

He earned every bit of the seventh-place finish he snuck out of town with, too. The day improved his position in the standings considerably.

"We moved up to 17th in the standings, and I think that was about a 15-position jump," he said. "We're still over 300 points behind Michael (Waltrip). We've got a bunch of racing left, so we're not going to throw in the towel just yet."

Rupen Fofaria covers NASCAR for The Raleigh News & Observer and is a regular contributor to ESPN.com. He can be reached at rfofaria@newsobserver.com.