Michael McDowell

Michael Christopher McDowell (born December 21, 1984) is an American professional stock car racing driver.

He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 34 Ford Mustang Dark Horse for Front Row Motorsports.

He has also raced in open-wheel and sports cars.

McDowell began his career in open-wheel cars, which included competing in Formula Renault and Champ Car, and in sports cars like the Rolex Sports Car Series and 24 Hours of Daytona.

From karts, McDowell moved into Formula Renault with World Speed Motorsports in 2002 and won the Infineon Raceway, Las Vegas, and Firebird International Raceway events in his rookies season.

Moving up the ladder, McDowell would move to the Star Mazda Series in 2003.

He took victories at Sebring and Road America en route to a runner-up finish in the points.

McDowell won seven races in 2004 en route to winning the series championship.

McDowell would be picked up by Champ Car team Rocketsports for Surfer's Paradise and Mexico City, but decided to move on in 2005 to the Grand-Am Cup Series.

During his run for the Star Mazda Championship, McDowell met businessman Rob Finlay at the Bob Bondurant School of High Performance Driving, where McDowell was an instructor.

McDowell and Finlay soon established a partnership, and McDowell would drive his first sports car, a Porsche 996 in the Grand-Am Cup Series for Finlay Motorsports.

In 2005, McDowell would stay at Finlay, but moved up to the Rolex Sports Car Series, joining veteran Memo Gidley in a BMW powered Riley sponsored by the Make A Wish Foundation.

Together, they finished sixth in the overall points and took the team's first victory at Mexico City.

McDowell made history by becoming the youngest driver to stand on the podium for a Grand-Am race at Barber Motorsports Park, and became the first driver since Mario Andretti to compete in both an open-wheel race and a sports car race in the same weekend.

McDowell would also drive the team's No. 60 BMW M3 in the Grand-Am Cup series to a podium finish at Daytona International Speedway.

He moved to stock car racing in 2006 and his first Cup Series season came in 2008, the latter of which saw him attract attention for a violent qualifying crash at Texas Motor Speedway.

However, after losing his ride at Michael Waltrip Racing, much of McDowell's Cup career in the following years was with smaller teams, oftentimes as a start and park driver.

McDowell would stick with Finlay for 2006 and was again partnered with Gidley.

The duo would improve to fourth in points despite being winless.

McDowell also drove a No. 15 Ford Mustang with owner Finlay, driving the car to a win at Barber Motorsports Park.

He would cap off his Grand-Am year with a second-place finish at Miller Motorsports Park.

ARCA RE/MAX Series owner Eddie Sharp put McDowell behind the wheel of his No. 2 Dodge for five races of the 2006 season, starting with the Governor's Cup 200 at the Milwaukee Mile, where he scored a 34th-place finish.

McDowell finished in sixth place at Salem, fifth at Talladega, and fourth at Iowa.

McDowell returned to ESR to run the full schedule for Rookie of the Year honors in 2007.

McDowell was involved in controversy at Toledo Speedway when his ESR teammate, Ken Butler III spun him late in the race.

Butler would take his first win while McDowell would rally for a top ten finish.

McDowell got his first stock car win at Kentucky Speedway.

He followed that up with wins at Pocono, Chicagoland, and the season finale at Toledo.

Although McDowell was in contention for the ARCA Re/Max Series championship all season, he was unable to pose a serious threat to Frank Kimmel for Kimmel's ninth championship.

McDowell returned to the series for the 2012 24 Hours of Daytona, driving for Michael Shank Racing with drivers Jorge Goncalvez, Felipe Nasr, and Gastavo Yacamán.

The four drivers would end up finishing third.

He also has a win in the NASCAR Xfinity Series in 2016.

McDowell started his career at the age of three racing BMX bicycles.

He would always win his division because there were not any other three or four year olds to compete against.

At the start of each race, someone would have to hold him in the starting gate because his feet did not reach the ground.

Then, when McDowell was eight years old, he moved to karting with help from his mother Tracy, his father Bill, and his older brother Billy, who were all avid race fans.

After ten years in karts, he would win not only the World Karting Association championship, but he would also take back to back International Kart Federation championships, along with 18 consecutive feature wins.

McDowell did not run full-time in the Cup Series again until 2017 with Leavine Family Racing when he ran all 36 races.

McDowell joined his current employer Front Row in 2018 and has raced full-time for the team ever since.

He won the 2021 Daytona 500 with FRM, McDowell's first-ever win in the Cup Series.