Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Sonoma Media Availability
Wednesday, July 9, 2025
Zane Smith, driver of the No. 38 Front Row Motorsports Ford Mustang Dark Horse in the NASCAR Cup Series, has reached the quarterfinal round of the inaugural In-Season Challenge and he will go head-to-head against Ty Gibbs this weekend as Sonoma Raceway plays host this weekend. Smith spoke about the matchup and his season to date as part of Ford’s weekly media call.
ZANE SMITH, No. 38 Front Row Motorsports Ford Mustang Dark Horse – YOU ARE UP AGAINST TY GIBBS THIS WEEKEND FOR A CHANCE TO REACH THE SEMIFINALS. HOW DO YOU VIEW YOUR MATCHUP? “It’s cool to still be alive in this bracket challenge. My last week’s pairing with Chris (Buescher), I knew we were gonna have our work cut out for us just with Chris’ stats, but it’s still racing and things happen and we were able to advance. I know going into this week if we did advance it was going to be either Ty or AJ, who are both great road racers, so you know they’re gonna have speed in Sonoma, and I think as will I. I enjoyed the repave at Sonoma and had a lot of fun there last year, so I’m hoping for another solid day. I hope to advance this week as well, but with that said, I’m focused on beating everyone and hopefully advancing into these playoffs.”
YOU AND CHRIS WERE RIGHT NEXT TO EACH OTHER ON A LATE-RACE RESTART. WAS THAT A FOCUS AT THAT POINT? “I was definitely reminded about it a good bit throughout the race. I know he was having engine issues, so I would obviously pull him by about three to five car lengths on the straightaways, if that, and then through the infield he was still just as fast, if not faster than a lot of guys, so I was always really happy to go on the straightaways. I was happy to advance there and we’re one step closer to a million bucks.”
IS YOUR TEAM GOING TO WATCH WHAT TY GIBBS DOES IN REGARDS TO STRATEGY, OR WILL YOU JUST FOCUS ON WINNING THE RACE? “I’m not too sure, yet. It depends where we’re at on speed, what our day is shaping up to be. At Chicago, I was supposed to short pit and I got blind behind the 12 and nicked the wall in 11 and got a decent amount of damage and somehow I was able to keep going. I was supposed to pit there and probably line up inside the top 10 or closer to the front after that, but, instead, I kept going and I think got eighth in the stage or something like that. Ultimately, it just got crazy toward the end as they often do, so you never want to get damage or have that happen because I fought that for the rest of the race, but we got some stage points there and once it did get crazy I was able to get by a lot of it and still salvage a decent finish, getting a top 15. I think you’re gonna see a lot of that still at Sonoma. I don’t know if you’ll see as crazy of things happen probably, but you never know. I’m just gonna be focused on ourselves and see where we shake out to be. Obviously, we want to leave there with a trophy and hopefully at top five, top 10 day, and have some good speed, which I feel confident in, but, if not, then we’re gonna do what we can to finish in front of the 54 and advance and live another week.”
WHAT WILL YOU SPEND THE MILLION BUCKS ON IF YOU WIN IT ALL? “I don’t know how much I would totally get, but hopefully I’d be able to get a decent chunk and be able to split it across the whole 38 team and they can go and do whatever they want with it. Then, if I’ve got any left over, maybe put some money towards a pool or something.”
WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SONOMA AND WATKINS GLEN? “I had an awesome time at Watkins Glen last year. The weather we got that whole weekend was awesome and my car was really good, so I hope to have another round of that this year. Comparing Sonoma and Watkins Glen, I would say since Sonoma got repaved they’re pretty similar, it’s just really fast-paced. It seems like a qualifying lap every lap. Sonoma used to be incredibly worn out and you’d have only two or maybe three laps of good on the tires. Now, it seems like you’re just pushing every single lap and it’s very demanding. I would say Watkins Glen, there are some bigger braking zones. Sonoma, it seems a little bit more technical and momentum based, but they’re both awesome road courses and it’s cool to obviously get two different fan bases from each side of the country. That’s super cool, but one week at a time. I’m trying to get a Sonoma trophy and hopefully advance and go compete down at Watkins Glen.”
HOW DO YOU ASSESS WHERE YOU TEAM IS AT RIGHT NOW, AND NASCAR ANNOUNCED THAT BOWMAN GRAY WILL ONCE AGAIN HOST THE CLASH NEXT YEAR. HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THAT? “Our year so far, I feel like it’s been pretty good. We’ve had pretty good speed and made our cars better throughout the whole weekend, which is a lot to be proud of. The first half, my Daytona 500 didn’t go well. I got hardly any points and then obviously not many points at the 600 and then Mexico as well, so without those, I feel pretty confident I would be well inside the top 20 in points. It’s incredibly close right now, but with this back half of the year starting at Atlanta my main goal was to try to stack up some top 10s and be a little bit more consistent and focus in on things where we lacked in the first half. I feel like we’ve done a good job of that so far in this back half of the year. We have a long way to go, but hopefully we can keep that going. Talking about Bowman Gray, I’m excited for that. The Madhouse was pretty electric. I got pretty used up in my heat race and then the LCQ as well, so that sucked for me, but I wasn’t the only one that got used up. Hopefully, this year goes a little bit better for us, but the fan base was definitely cool to experience. It’s a pretty tiny track, but hopefully it can be better for us next year.”
FRONT ROW HAS PERFORMED WELL ON ROAD COURSES OF LATE. HOW HAVE YOU PREPARED FOR THIS WEEKEND? “Going back from the first road course, COTA was a big struggle for us. Last year, I felt like every road course I came around I was like, ‘This is my opportunity to have a really good weekend.’ Then, like I said, COTA didn’t go well for us and then we went to Mexico and didn’t start the weekend great, and then made a lot of changes overnight, got my car a ton better and then it started raining and I was able to pass a lot of cars. My car was pretty good, even in the rain, and then got involved in that wreck on the frontstretch, so I didn’t learn a whole lot, but I feel we did in practice and qualifying, and a little bit of the dry we did get to learn about our car. We made it a lot better going into Chicago and I was hoping and praying that it was gonna align with that and it really did. Starting the weekend at Chicago my car was really good and a lot more to my liking, so that made me excited again for the road courses. We timed that well with two back-to-back, so, with that, Sonoma is a whole different animal than Chicago, a lot smoother and just way different. Typically, your road course package translates to different road courses pretty well once you do figure it out, it seems like, so hopefully that’s the case for us but we will find out shortly.”
HOW NICE WAS IT TO HAVE A CHICAGO RACE WITHOUT THE RAIN? “I had an awesome time. I didn’t get to do all three years, but I got to do it last year and, obviously, this year. It is a lot more fun in the dry. I’m glad it stayed dry for our third and final time, and it was awesome to see a different style of fan base and just a different vibe to the weekend. It’s good to experience and hopefully there’s more of it in NASCAR’s future.”
AS WE GET CLOSER, HOW DO YOU NOT LET THE IN-SEASON CHALLENGE MESS WITH YOUR MIND WHEN YOU’RE OUT THERE RACING IN A TURN TRYING TO GET THAT ONE SPOT? “I think every week you advance that pressure just builds on trying to, ‘Alright, we’re getting pretty close to this million bucks,’ and it becomes a lot more real. Atlanta was like, ‘Alright, who knows? A lot can happen here.’ And then it’s like, ‘Oh, sweet. We advanced.’ Like I said, I was paired up with Chris at Chicago and I feel confident about myself and road courses. That’s what I grew up doing and feel like I can compete for wins, but I knew Chris and his stats were undeniable and he was gonna be really tough to beat, but it’s still racing and we were able to advance there. It’s another challenge this week with Ty Gibbs and the 54 team. You know Ty is gonna be fast down in Sonoma. He has a great car and he’s shown a lot of speed on road courses. If it wasn’t Ty, I think it was AJ Allmendinger. Obviously, AJ isn’t too bad either about lefts and rights, so it’s another challenge. We’ll just try to execute a better weekend than they do and see if we advance, and then I think we’re onto four and then I think I’ll be paired up with either Preece or Reddick at Dover, which are both gonna be pretty strong and we’ll see if we get past that one. I think the pressure will definitely set in after that about winning this first-ever tournament, a million bucks. I don’t care how much money you’ve got, a million bucks is still a million bucks, so that’s cool to be able to compete with that and even make it into this round of eight. Hopefully, we keep it going and stay alive.”
DO YOU TRY TO KEEP IT OUT OF YOUR MIND OR NOT? “I don’t want to speak for Ty, but I feel like we’re both in the boat as of today of ‘we’re going to Sonoma to try to win the race and advance to the playoffs’ We’re real close together in points and with that we’re focused on having a good day, but our weekends are gonna shake out where different things and different kinds of adversity is going to thrown at us. We’re each gonna have our own strategy, so we could run nowhere near each other and never see each other all day, but probably with this bracket challenge and how things work out in this sport, we will be right next to each other all day long. Who knows? All I can hope for is to have a shot at it and hopefully keep this consistency up that we’ve been having. I’m sure I’ll get told once or twice about where he’s running or what’s going on with him and what strategy they’re doing and many other things, but, ultimately, we’re trying to advance to the playoffs.”
WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON DOVER. HAVE YOU DONE ANY PREP WORK YET ON THAT TRACK? “Not quite yet. I haven’t looked at Dover, yet. I try to take it one week at a time and put as much attention as I can on one week and not get too far ahead of myself, but with that said, the conversations about Dover are popping up already. A big topic is it’s a different time of year that we’re racing there and the potential is there for it to be really hot. It’s obviously a really demanding place, and I think you could see some track changes, too, with just how hot it potentially is going to be. Typically, that means more rubber is gonna get laid down, which creates more lanes, which is great for us. Any opportunity we can get to search for cleaner air is always a great thing, so I’m actually looking at my 2020 Truck win trophy right in front of me from Dover, and I would love to get a big version of Miles. Dover has always been one of my favorite racetracks and hopefully we can continue my love for Dover, but it’s gonna be a challenge as it is every time no matter how good your car is whenever you show up there. I’m excited to see what that weekend brings, but hopefully it’s a good one and hopefully we’re still alive in the bracket challenge and advance to that final round.”
SOME NEWS CAME OUT ON THE LEGAL CHALLENGES WITH FRONT ROW AND YOU POSSIBLY BEING AN OPEN CAR AS SOON AS DOVER. WHAT IS THE IMPACT ON THAT FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE, AND WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO DO DURING THIS PERIOD OF UNCERTAINTY? “I obviously saw some of that news. I don’t know when that is going to go into effect. That’s well above my pay grade, but my focus is on just competing to the best of my capability with this whole 38 group, and my role is to bring good energy to my team and keep them fired up. Fortunately, Ryan Bergenty just does that. He’s an incredible leader and has been a lot of fun to work with. We’re all just focused on our jobs and allowing the lawyers to take care of that side. We’re racers, not lawyers. I don’t know anything about that, so I’m not gonna act like I do. We’re excited to go compete and with this charter change we often don’t see 40-plus cars, so I don’t know what it will look like, but I know I’ll still have the same tools every Saturday for practice and qualifying, and the same for the race. My seat is not gonna change, so I’m just trying to continue to stack up some good runs and hopefully get Bob Jenkins a win here shortly.”
YOU HAVE HAD TO GO THROUGH A LOT LAST YEAR AND THIS YEAR. DO YOU HOPE YOU EVER GET TO A TIME WHEN YOU CAN ENJOY A NORMAL NASCAR SEASON? OR HAS THAT HELPED MAKE YOU WORK THROUGH THESE DIFFERENT CHALLENGES? “I appreciate you recognizing that because it’s been a big, major challenge throughout my whole career. Since I was three years old, racing all my life and nothing ever came even close to easy, but, then again, I feel like that’s what has built me into who I am, and I believe I handle adversity well and get through the hard times and believe I get stronger from it. It’s been a unique year to say the least with all these things going on, and then my last year was just an ugly year. There was a lot of unknowns and uncertainty and just kind of a bad taste, but with that you move forward. I’m fortunate to be back at FRM, back in the 38, back with the Ford family and I’m incredibly thankful for that. I’m trying to do better at living in the now and appreciating what I’ve got. Hopefully, I have a long future racing on Sunday, but nothing is ever promised in motorsports, so I hope to stay competing on Sunday, but I’m gonna enjoy what I’m doing one week at a time.”
DO YOU FEEL YOU ARE RUNNING BETTER IN THIS RECENT STRETCH OR DOING THE SAME THINGS YOU WERE DOING EARLY IN THE YEAR AND THEY JUST WEREN’T WORKING OUT? “To be honest, earlier in the season if you watch and see where we ran throughout a lot of the race and then little dumb things would happen where there was a crazy caution or maybe we weren’t quite where we needed to be on pit road a little too late in the race and you get set back and you run out of time. I felt like that happened a lot. I don’t know how many times I’ve finished 11th this year, but I felt that if I was one spot better, it would be talked about a lot differently of a lot more top 10s, but I’m really proud of the speed we’ve been able to bring. The capability we’ve had of making our cars better, which is incredibly important, and I’m just having a lot of fun working with this group. For this back half of the year, like I mentioned, I really wanted to just try and stack up these top 10s and hopefully find myself in contention on one of these late-race restarts in the first few rows and try to execute a win. At Atlanta, we came close to that, leading some of those closing laps, which was good fuel for my whole team and myself. I believe our speed is there to do it, as a team we’ve got to execute the whole day. Sunday races are long and there’s a lot of opportunity to mess up, but with that said, everything just has to go right and we’re getting closer to doing everything right. I think that’s why you’re seeing these more consistent top 15 days and racing inside the top 10, collecting stage points here and there. Those things just go a long way, so hopefully we can keep that going.”
