| Stewart Friesen | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
_(cropped).jpg) Friesen atDarlington Raceway in 2021 | |||||||
| Born | Stewart J. Friesen (1983-07-25)July 25, 1983 (age 42) Niagara-on-the-Lake,Ontario, Canada | ||||||
| Awards | 2010, 2014, 2015, 2020, 2021 EMPA North East Driver of the Year[1] | ||||||
| NASCARCup Series career | |||||||
| 1 race run over 1 year | |||||||
| 2021 position | 55th | ||||||
| Best finish | 55th (2021) | ||||||
| First race | 2021Food City Dirt Race (Bristol Dirt) | ||||||
| |||||||
| NASCARCraftsman Truck Series career | |||||||
| 201 races run over 11 years | |||||||
| Truck no., team | No. 52 (Halmar Friesen Racing) | ||||||
| 2025 position | 20th | ||||||
| Best finish | 4th (2019) | ||||||
| First race | 2016Aspen Dental Eldora Dirt Derby (Eldora) | ||||||
| Last race | 2026Fresh From Florida 250 (Daytona) | ||||||
| First win | 2019Eldora Dirt Derby (Eldora) | ||||||
| Last win | 2025DQS Solutions & Staffing 250 (Michigan) | ||||||
| |||||||
| NASCARCanada Series career | |||||||
| 3 races run over 2 years | |||||||
| 2023 position | 40th | ||||||
| Best finish | 39th (2022) | ||||||
| First race | 2022 Pinty's 100 (Ohsweken) | ||||||
| Last race | 2023 Pinty's 100 (Ohsweken) | ||||||
| |||||||
| Modified racing career | |||||||
| Debut season | 2000 | ||||||
| Car number | 1, 10a, 20, 24, 44 | ||||||
| Wins | 433[2] | ||||||
| Previous series | |||||||
| 2013–present Wins 1999–2013 Wins | Sprint car racing 19 TQ Midgets 7 | ||||||
| Championship titles | |||||||
| 2020Mr. Dirt Champion 2014NASCAR New York State Champion[3] 2010, 2013, 2014, 2015Race of Champions Dirt Modified Tour | |||||||
| Statistics up to date as of February 14, 2026. | |||||||
Stewart J. Friesen (born July 25, 1983) is a Canadian-American professionaldirt track andstock car racing driver. He competes full-time in theNASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, driving the No. 52Toyota Tundra TRD Pro forHalmar Friesen Racing, and part-time at local dirt tracks acrossNew York,Pennsylvania,New Jersey, and elsewhere in the United States, driving the No. 44 car for HFR.
Friesen started racing early in life, his family owningRansomville Speedway in WesternNew York.[4] After racinggo-karts, Friesen raced big-blocks with widespread success in theNortheast United States, advancing to the 2010 World Finals atCharlotte Motor Speedway.[5] He was the 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015 Modified track champion atFonda Speedway.[6]
Friesen was one of the top competitors in the SuperDIRT Series in the mid-2010s, and he also has triumphed in theWorld of Outlaws sprint car series, winning over 230 career races as of the end of the 2017 season.[7] He has won the Syracuse 200 Modified race four times.[8] Friesen has run over nine-hundred dirt races in his career.[9] Eventually, he met Chris Larsen, who gave Friesen his firstNASCAR ride atEldora Speedway, which was supposed to be a one-time deal. However, the partnership blossomed into a full-time ride.[10]
On occasion, Friesen runs NASCAR and dirt on the same day.[11] He maintains an active presence on New York dirt tracks such as Fonda Speedway and Utica-Rome Speedway.[12]
Breaking intoNASCAR with the 2016Aspen Dental Eldora Dirt Derby, Friesen put his No. 16Halmar Racing truck into the twelfth starting spot on thegrid by virtue of a second-place finish in his heat. However, contact withCaleb Holman ruined his night,[13] and Friesen's debut race resulted in a 28th-place finish. Running five more races in the season, Friesen recorded three top-twenty finishes, the best being a thirteenth atNew Hampshire Motor Speedway.[14]
On January 9, 2017, Friesen announced that he would run the full 2017 season in the Halmar Friesen Racing (HFR) No. 52 truck withTommy Baldwin Jr. coming on as a team manager.[15][16] In June, following the first seven races of the season, HFR announced it would undergo a two-week hiatus before returning atKentucky Speedway in July.[17] At Eldora, Friesen qualified on thepole position and remained in the place for the start of the feature after winning his heat race.[18] He led more than half the laps and claimed the victory in the second stage but lost the lead toMatt Crafton in the closing laps, finishing a then-career-best second.[19] About a month after Eldora run, the team took another two-race break while severing its relationship with Baldwin and making a new technical alliance withGMS Racing.[20] After returning to competition, Friesen scored four finishes of seventh or better in the season's last six races, climbing to fourteenth in the season-ending points tally.[21]
For 2018, HFR continued the alliance with GMS, so much so that GMS driverJohnny Sauter referenced Friesen as a teammate. After advancing to the playoffs and a best finish of second on three occasions throughout the year, he finished seventh in the final points standings after being eliminated in the Round of 8.
Friesen remained at HFR in an alliance with GMS for the third straight year in 2019. He was also contacted byJR Motorsports to run a partial schedule in theNASCAR Xfinity Series, but nothing came of it.[22] AtKansas Speedway, Friesen led both practices, won both Stage One and Stage Two and led the most laps, but ran out of fuel with three laps to go due to a pit communication on the previous pit stop, in which the fuelman did not put enough fuel in the truck, handing the win toRoss Chastain and relegating Friesen to fifteenth, furthering a streak of near-misses for Friesen.[23] On August 1, 2019, Friesen won his first career NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series race atEldora.[24] On November 8, Friesen achieved his second career victory and his first on a paved track by winning atPhoenix after passingBrandon Jones with four laps remaining.[25] As a result, Friesen qualified for the Championship 4 for the first time but ultimately finished eleventh atHomestead and fourth in the final standings.
After missing the playoffs in 2020, Friesen later abandoned a full-time Truck schedule and skipped a race atKansas Speedway in order to run the Short Track Super Series atPort Royal Speedway.[26] On the night of the Kansas truck event, Friesen finished second to Mat Williamson in a $53,000-to-win race at Port Royal.[27]
Friesen returned with his No. 52 team to the Truck Series full-time in 2021, and despite having a worse season and missing the playoffs in 2020, HFR remained with Toyota. Later in the year, Friesen would make his debut in theNASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 77 forSpire Motorsports in the series' newdirt race atBristol. Despite driving a Toyota in the Truck Series, Friesen drove for Spire, a Chevrolet team, in this one race. He finished 23rd, one lap down.[28] Despite not winning a Truck race for the second straight season, Friesen made the Playoffs, scored his best of second in the season finale at Phoenix, and finished sixth in the final standings.
On May 20, 2022, Friesen broke a 54-race winless streak in the Truck Series by scoring his third career victory at Texas after passingChristian Eckes for the lead in Overtime.
Friesen returned to the Truck Series in 2023. He scored five top-fives and seven top-tens, but went winless and missed the playoffs. He finished twelfth in the final standings.
The 2024 season would follow a similar trend, with Friesen scoring seven top-ten finishes and one top-five, as well as a pole atNashville. He would again finish twelfth in the standings.
Friesen started the2025 season with a 23rd-place finish atDaytona. Friesen broke a 72-race drought with a win atMichigan in triple-overtime.[29]
On July 28, 2025, Friesen was competing in aSuper DIRTcar Series event at the Autodrome Drummond when he suffered a high-speed accident that resulted in a fractured pelvis and right leg.[30] Friesen was forced to sit-out the remainder of the season due to the injuries he suffered.Christopher Bell filled in for him atWatkins Glen, andKaden Honeycutt, who had just been released from his ride atNiece Motorsports, would drive for the final eight races, starting atRichmond.[31]
Friesen grew up inNiagara-on-the-Lake,Ontario, and playedhockey as a child. He attended theUniversity of Windsor, attaining a degree in science.[32]
Friesen is married toJessica Friesen (née Zemken).[33] The two have one son.[4] Friesen and his wife also run a t-shirt printing business (One-Zee Tees), which was originally a fallback plan in case racing did not work out.[32] They live inSprakers, New York.[34]
(key) (Bold – Pole position awarded by qualifying time.Italics – Pole position earned by points standings or practice time. * – Most laps led. Small number below track name denotes finishing position.)
| NASCAR Cup Series results | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Team | No. | Make | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | NCSC | Pts | Ref |
| 2021 | Spire Motorsports | 77 | Chevy | DAY | DRC | HOM | LVS | PHO | ATL | BRD 23 | MAR | RCH | TAL | KAN | DAR | DOV | COA | CLT | SON | NSH | POC | POC | ROA | ATL | NHA | GLN | IRC | MCH | DAY | DAR | RCH | BRI | LVS | TAL | ROV | TEX | KAN | MAR | PHO | 55th | 01 | [35] |
* Season still in progress
1 Ineligible for series points
| NASCAR Pinty's Series results | ||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Team | No. | Make | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | NPSC | Pts | Ref |
| 2022 | 22 Racing | 22 | Chevy | SUN | MSP | ACD | AVE | TOR | EDM | SAS | SAS | CTR | OSK 2 | ICAR | MSP | DEL | 39th | 42 | [45] | |
| 2023 | Wight Motorsports | 19 | Chevy | SUN | MSP | ACD | AVE | TOR | EIR | SAS | SAS | CTR | OSK 6 | OSK 22 | ICAR | MSP | DEL | 40th | 60 | [46] |
(key)
| CARS Super Late Model Tour results | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Team | No. | Make | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | CSLMTC | Pts | Ref |
| 2018 | N/A | 112 | Toyota | MYB | NSH 2 | ROU | HCY | N/A | 0 | [47] | |||||
| Chevy | BRI 2 | AND | HCY | ROU | SBO | ||||||||||
