Dirt Sprint Car racing always occupied a space in Noah West’s mind no matter where life took him.
How could it not, after growing up in an environment that brought the likes of Jimmy Carr, Steve “Scuba” Swenson, Sonny Kreitzer, and others around him?
West was born in New York right into a racing family and moved to a major motorsports hub during his formative years.
“It’s kind of been something that we’ve always been involved in,” West said. “That’s why we actually moved out here to Indy. My dad (Jeff West) started Supermodified racing out in the northeast up in Oswego, building his own cars, chassis, stuff like that. Then he actually moved to Indy to work for Eddie Cheever in IndyCar doing some repair work and carbon repair stuff. From there, he started his own business with IPC.”
His father’s business introduced him to the famed crew chiefs previously mentioned. It’s also the time when he began to learn the mechanical basics of race cars. Lessons learned from his dad and other key figures would eventually lead West to wrenching for his own family’s World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car operation.
“My dad obviously taught me a lot of what I know from the mechanical side of things,” West said. “I spent a lot of time with Brinton Marvel and his dad Justin and was kind of just always learning as well with Ayrton (Olsen) and his dad. I was always surrounded by some really good minds in the sport.”
West’s teenage years brought a new passion outside of racing: hockey. The same competitive drive that fueled his family’s racing endeavors helped West reach Big Ten Conference level collegiate competition at the University of Michigan before a season of professional play in the ECHL with the Kansas City Mavericks.
“I raced Go-Karts when I was growing up, but hockey took over,” West recalled. “It just consumes your life, the same as Sprint Car racing. If you’re not eating, breathing, and sleeping hockey, you’re not going to be successful at it and be able to do it at the level we’re trying to do it at. Hockey, yeah, it’s a winter sport, but it’s really year-round. You’re training day in and day out six days a week, sometimes seven depending on the time of year. So, it consumed a ton of time and was a blast.”
Hockey may have required most of his time, but his love for racing never wavered. West remained involved in his family’s team, Three Stooges Racing, and their primarily pavement race cars. West truly began to lean into the dirt when the opportunity arose to turn the wrenches on the Hayward Motorsports No. 19 in 2023. That combination started strong as C.J. Leary put the car in the Eldora Million and finished 12th.
As West continued to lead the Hayward crew, the hunger to launch his own Sprint Car operation grew. He periodically attempted to persuade his father until finally he was convinced to add a dirt Winged Sprint Car to the Three Stooges stable.
“It was always something I really wanted to do,” West said of going Winged Sprint Car racing on dirt. “I mean, the pavement cars were fun, but I always told dad, ‘We need to have a Winged Sprint Car. Let’s go Winged Sprint Car racing.’ And it was always, ‘Well, when you’re out of college, we’ll start putting that together.’ Sure enough, my last year of college, the deal with Brodie (Hayward) was kind of ending, and I told my dad, ‘This is what I want to do still. We’re getting close to that time. Let’s do something.’ That was right after Kings Royal that year. I think we sat in the shop and talked and said let’s do it. He drove 10 minutes home to the house, and by the time I got home he called me and said, ‘Well, I got two cars on the way, and we’ll start this and put it together and see what we can do.’”
The Three Stooges Racing No. 51 Sprint Car debuted during the 2025 Kings Royal week with Joel Myers Jr. in the seat. Eventually, Scott Bogucki came aboard to close out the year with a pick-and-choose schedule as a plan began to form for them to go World of Outlaws racing in 2026.
“My dad was driving somewhere with my mom, probably leaving a brother’s hockey game or something; he called me and said, ‘I think we should just go Outlaw racing,’” West said. “I was like, ‘If that’s what you want to do, we’ll do it.’ He did some more talking to some people that we know and got everything together.”
They began the season with Bogucki and picked up a podium at only the eighth race of the campaign when he drove from ninth to second at Lawton Speedway. The two sides parted ways in May before the team brought Ashton Torgerson aboard for most of the summer. Then came their current pilot, Steven Snyder Jr., with his first weekend in the car at the Ironman 55 in early August.
West believes he and the 20-year-old out of Rising Sun, MD are gelling fast and laying the foundations of a potent partnership. The results agree. Snyder Jr. drove from 16th to sixth at the Front Row Challenge during just their fourth night together. Less than a month later, he led laps before a top-five finish at Huset’s Speedway. Then came a 10th-to-second charge at El Paso County Raceway for Snyder’s first World of Outlaws podium. He battled for a win at Ventura Raceway to close out September.
“Steven, he’s got very high upside and potential,” West said. “We both want to build together and work together. We’re both ultra-competitive. Will it bite us some nights? Yes, but at the end of the day if I’m out here giving 110%, the last thing I want is for my driver who’s getting in my race car to not give me 110% back. I feel like with Steven here these last three months, he’s came in and given us that. As a crew chief and car owner, that’s all we can ask for.”
The short-term future with Snyder isn’t all that’s on West’s mind as they continue to grow. This isn’t merely some quick experiment. West wants to construct an organization to contend with the best of the best for years to come. He knows he may not always be able to be the one going up and down the road with the team, but he’s putting the pieces in place for his team to do so and continue the family racing tradition he was born into.
“I’d like to establish it into something like Big Game and what Tod Quiring has built there and KCP (Racing), Roth (Motorsports). I want to establish us to be something like that,” West said. “Whether it’s myself out here on the road full-time for years to come, I don’t know. I want to keep doing it, and I want to be out here for a few more years, but I’d like to turn it into something where when it’s time to have a family and kids and stuff I can also be at home while our team will be out here competing with the World of Outlaws.”
West, Snyder Jr., and the Three Stooges Racing crew continue to wind down the 2026 season this weekend at Indiana’s Lincoln Park Speedway on Friday, Oct. 16, and Illinois’ Belle-Clair Fairgrounds Park Speedway on Saturday, Oct. 17. For tickets, CLICK HERE.
Where can you watch every World of Outlaws race? Live on DIRTVision.
Where can you see the World of Outlaws in 2026? Click to see the full schedule.