LAKE CITY, Fla. – NASCAR Camping World Truck Series regular and big-block modified star Stewart Friesen will tackle a different challenge on the dirt during Florida Speedweeks.
Friesen and his Halmar International-backed racing team will add a dirt late model to their modified and Truck Series endeavors next year, campaigning the late model in select races.
He confirmed the news in a video posted to his personal Twitter account Wednesday night.
BREAKING NEWS. We’re really looking forward to this: pic.twitter.com/G5qE8TXRK0
— Stewart Friesen (@StewartFriesen) December 30, 2020
The 37-year-old native of Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, will compete in four Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series events, starting at All-Tech Raceway in Lake City, Fla., on Jan. 22-23 and continuing at Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala, Fla., on Feb. 1-2.
His ride, which will carry the familiar No. 44 that fans have come to associate with Friesen’s dirt modified exploits, will be a Longhorn Chassis with a Cornett racing engine, according to a report from Dirt on Dirt.
The dirt late model will be housed in the Halmar Friesen Racing Truck Series shop in Statesville, N.C., and Friesen will receive technical support from Tommy Grecco, who formerly crew chiefed for Tim McCreadie and now works at Longhorn Chassis.
“I’ve been very fortunate to be able to make a living driving race cars,” Friesen told Dirt on Dirt. “I’ve driven for some great car owners over the years, but with Chris Larsen’s support I’m very excited for this opportunity to be able to branch out into late model racing.”
Friesen’s only prior foray with fenders on dirt came at Utica-Rome (N.Y.) Speedway in a crate-engine late model nearly 10 years ago. This will be his first time racing a full-fledged dirt super late model.
Between big-block and small-block modifieds, Friesen led the Northeast with 28 feature victories in 2020, but struggled on the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series side by failing to make the playoffs and finishing a disappointing 15th in driver points.
Friesen did end his NASCAR campaign with a bit of positive momentum by earning back-to-back sixth-place finishes at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway and Arizona’s Phoenix Raceway to close out the season.