The laughs, the inside jokes, the good-natured grief they readily give each another are all eclipsed by a common thread — true friendship and ultimate respect.
Front Row Motorsports’ 2025 NASCAR Cup Series driver lineup of Todd Gilliland, Zane Smith and Noah Gragson represents not only a collection of the sport’s outstanding young talent, but a trio of legitimate longtime friends with West Coast roots ready to make their mark on the highest levels of the sport.
Spend time around these young men and it’s incredibly apparent that the only thing they can’t agree on is which one will win a NASCAR Cup Series race first. There is no doubt, however, how they will celebrate.
Together.
“Who’s going to win first? We’d all have to say ourselves on that one,” said Gragson, driver of Front Row Motorsport’s No. 4 Ford. “But after the race, we’re all going to Zane’s house.”
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That was the prevailing opinion among the three, who represent the youngest collective driver lineup among the Cup Series teams. Gilliland is 24 years old, Smith is 25 and Gragson is the team “veteran” at 26.
As NASCAR arrives at Phoenix Raceway this week and moves to Las Vegas next, the West Coast Swing — as it is affectionately known — marks the area of the country where these three drivers turned their earliest laps and began their careers. It’s a sentimental portion of the schedule for the California-native Smith, Las Vegas’s Gragson and Gilliland, whose family’s roots are in California, too.
Racing against one another as young kids is one thing, but to end up together on the same team after reaching the pinnacle of stock car racing is another.
“Todd and Noah were racing K&N (now ARCA West) and I was on the ARCA side, so in that time, they would do some ARCA races. And I knew Todd because we were in friend group chats,” Smith explained of the roots of a friendship that has endured for a decade and paid off in this unexpected opportunity at Front Row.
“At first, we were all at times in different series, which is weird to look back on. At one point, Noah and I were teammates — I was part-time and Noah was on the Xfinity side. Todd was in trucks a year before me and then I was in trucks for four years and joined Todd there. Then obviously, at that point we’re all pretty much hanging out together every weekend. And now we’ve found each other all teammates on Sunday which is super cool.”
Gilliland agreed.
“Growing up for me, there weren’t friends who really understood racing like that,” said Gilliland, driver of the No. 34 Front Row Motorsports Ford. “You’re always gone on the weekends when most people can hang out, so for me, that’s why it’s easiest to have friends in racing.
“Sure, sometimes it’s hard because you have stuff that goes on in the race track. But it’s just so easy to hang out because you’re traveling together every single weekend. Our wives and Noah’s girlfriend get along and that makes it a lot easier, too.”
Through three early-season races, the Front Row Motorsports youth movement seems to be a promising venture. All three drivers have a finish of 11th or better across the past two weeks. Gragson (eighth) and Gilliland (10th ) are coming off their best 2025 outputs at last weekend’s race at Circuit of The Americas. Smith finished 11th at Atlanta two weeks ago.
“All three guys bring along with their significant driving talent a marketability with their own unique personalities,” Front Row Motorsports General Manager Jerry Freeze noted. “Their being of roughly the same age, having grown up in the social media era, they each have a comfort in using their platforms to create content and get their message out to the fans.
“The added bonus of their having raced and built friendships with each other back in the West Coast when they were all just beginning their stock car careers, keeps the communication open among them and it naturally is shared with their teams at Front Row.
“It is fun to see and I have to believe it will raise the overall competitiveness of our team on the track and commercially with our partners.”
While some race teams have endured less-than-friendly rivalries among its driver lineups — in some instances, real rivalries — this group at Front Row seems to have honed in on a way to expect the best from themselves, but appreciate it coming from their teammates too.
“I think it’s been really productive,” said Gragson, who is in his first year at Front Row. “It’s obviously easy to have the relationships there because we’re all buddies off the track. But it’s a really good balance.
“When we get to the race track we all work really hard and truly want to see each other succeed. It’s a lot of fun also, having two of your best buddies as teammates. You want the best for each other at the end of the day so it’s been a good time. You really want to see each other succeed and do good for the company at FRM and I think we’re in a really good spot right now.”
“We all have each other’s back,” Gilliland said. “I’ve had teammates I’ve had good relationships with but with us, we know each other’s demeanor and attitude and I feel like it’s so much easier to communicate and get to the bottom of issues, get through things faster during the race weekend. It’s been nice.”
Each of these drivers brings his own — unmistakable — quality to the table. But as well as they get along both on and off the track, they have very different personalities and readily concede as much.
“I think Noah’s always very outspoken, Zane is always very relaxed and I’m somewhere in the middle,” Gilliland acknowledged.
“It’s super funny at the meetings, we all have our different personalities and the way we do things but it’s fun when it all comes together.”
Adds Gragson: “Actually everyone kind of compliments one another in a certain way.”
For the past two years — even before they all came together as teammates — Smith has rented a home in Scottsdale, Arizona, for them all to stay and enjoy the West Coast swing that without the cross-country back-and-forth, allows a little time for cookouts and time by the pool. Gilliland is expected to buy the burgers, Gragson takes care of the propane for the grill and Smith does the cooking.
At home in Charlotte, they have similarly vibing existences. Smith describes Gilliland’s home with wife Marissa as the “family house” but concedes his is rapidly evolving the same way after Smith’s wedding to wife McCall in January 2024. And for the bachelor Gragson? “You never know what you’re going to get,” Smith said smiling. “The whole dining room has Legos all over it.”
It’s indicative of the unique character each brings to the team but also of the cherished friendship they’ve been able to maintain as competitors and now teammates.
“I think it’s been cool to see all the teams work together so well,” Gilliland said. “That’s been really refreshing to me to see a whole unified group, even though it’s only been speedways and road courses, I think we’re going to be in a really good spot with the races coming up at Phoenix and Vegas.”
“Last year, me and Noah had a couple on-track racing incidents,” he readily acknowledges. “That happens. That’s the fun of racing each other. This is our 10th year racing each other and things are going to happen but as teammates it’s way more important to get past that stuff quick and talk through it. As teammates we resolve things very quickly.”
The result is being stronger together.
“With co-workers, sometimes you’re in a situation where you like some more than others and that’s just the nature of the beast,” Gragson said. “But for us, it’s a super natural relationship and we all get along really well just because of our friendship off the race track. Sometimes it can feel forced that you have to like your teammate, but in this case it’s super-natural.
“Absolutely this feels different. I think we all came in pretty pumped up and excited just to finally be teammates. We’re good friends off the track but to be teammates on the track it made for a really exciting off-season and already, beginning of the year.”