The Dome at America's Center
Young Floridian finds spotlight on big stage
By Aaron Clay
DirtonDirt weekend editor
Brenden Smith finished seventh Saturday at The Dome. (photosbyboyd.smugmug.com)
ST. LOUIS, Mo. (Dec. 6) — In making his debut with Alabama-based JCM Motorsports, Brenden Smith of Dade City, Fla., enjoyed his best career performance during the ninth annual Kubota Gateway Dirt Nationals at The Dome at America's Center. | RaceWire
A night removed from a third-place finish in Friday’s second Gateway prelim — one that came with a bit of controversy — Smith slipped from his outside front-row starting spot to a seventh-place finish in Saturday’s 40-lap finale won flag-to-flag by polesitter Bobby Pierce.
Smith’s race, however, nearly ended on the opening turn of the first lap when he over-rotated at the turn-one entrance and appeared to spin, only to straighten his car only after hard contact in the driver’s side door from Mike Harrison’s right-front tire. A restart allowed him to recover and complete all 40 laps.
While the box score will show a loss of five positions, Smith called it “100 percent” his career-best performance on a big stage aboard a Super Late Model.
“Hell, I don’t think I’ve finished top-three in a Super (Late Model) race since … it’s been a couple years, two or three years, so it’s definitely pretty cool,” he said. “Especially to do it here, in front of 40,000 people, it’s insane.”
Smith, who made his 47th and final feature start of the 2025 season, notched his fifth top-five finished of the season in Friday’s prelim before adding his 15th top-10 finish in Saturday’s finale all while making his debut as driver of Colten Miller’s No. 19m entry.
“We were pretty solid all week. I had a fast car since we unloaded out of the box on Friday, so I really can’t ask for much more,” Smith added. “Last year I wasn’t even close to making the show at this race and we come and finish in the top 10 in the big show, so I’m pretty grateful to just have the opportunity to drive all this stuff for Colten and the whole team backing me.”
Speaking of Friday’s physical on-track altercation with fellow Florida driver Kyle Bronson and its resulting drama, Smith added “they support me through anything, even with all that craziness (Friday) night, they were right there with me, behind my back. I’m truly blessed to have them with me.”
The 20-year-old Smith attributed his immediate success and familiarity to the similarity in equipment shared between his own family-owned operation and that of his new team.
“Their car is pretty similar to mine, we both have (Rocket) XR 1.2 (chassis). Their cars are pretty good, so I’m really pumped to go into next year driving their stuff,” he said. “This is just kind of a temporary deal, racing out of my rig for this weekend, it was all thrown together so quick. We got everything stripped out of their (hauler) right now, so we can get ready for Lucas (Oil Late Model Dirt Series) racing next year. I’m pumped up.”
Updated to resemble Smith’s usual livery, the JCM No. 19m now appears blue, but with an added twist of a gold chain weaving its way through the numbers within the car’s wrap design.
“It’s Florida man. Kids from Florida, I guess it’s just a normal thing, we all wear gold chains,” Smith explained when asked about the significance of the gold chain which also appears on his driver’s suit. “I had long hair until right before we left, I got a haircut before I drove the rig over here Wednesday. It’s just the kind of culture from down where I’m from.”
The young Smith has more than 16 years of racing experience, though this is the first time he’s been hired to drive someone else’s equipment.
“I started racing go karts when I was 4 and we ran all over the place, all over the Southeast. I got in a Crate (Late Model) right before I turned 12 and I ran Crate cars until I was about 15 and right whenever I turned 16, we bought a race-ready Super (Late Model) from this guy,” Smith recalled. “It had an old Pro Power motor from the mid-90s in it and we went to East Bay (Raceway Park) and ran Speedweeks with it and that was my first steps in a Super. Since then, that’s all we’ve done.”
It’s safe to say Smith’s young career hasn’t exactly gone the way he would’ve envisioned — his last victory came April 15, 2023, at Florida’s Hendry County Speedway in unsanctioned Limited Late Models — he’s certainly maintaining a positive outlook after his Dome performance and hopes that success will carry right into the 2026 Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series season.
Smith ran the Lucas Oil tour in 2024, finished 15th in points with a single top-10 finish, then ran an independent schedule in 2005 with a midseason focus on the DIRTcar Summer Nationals, where he had three top-10 finishes and finished eighth in points.
“Definitely starting next year a little bit ahead of where we started last year, I feel like,” Smith said. “We’ve got a little bit of momentum to go into next year and hit it hard.”
Finding the road to success steep and challenging, Smith remains thankful for his biggest supporters and the opportunities he continues to be afforded.
“My grandfather, we call him ‘Big Dad,’ that’s the Big Daddy’s Cattle (sponsor) on the side of the car. I really can’t thank him enough, he’s put me in a position to be able to come out here and do all this and put me in a position to actually drive for somebody, which is something I never thought I’d get the chance to do,” Smith said. “He spent a lot of money getting me up and down the road, doing this, whenever we were sucking, so it’s pretty cool whenever I can recognize him when we’re running pretty solid on a big stage like this. I know he’s at home, probably proud.”
