As the NASCAR Cup Series heads to Kansas Speedway this Sunday, Todd Gilliland may not be the first driver you think of but you may want to keep in mind for a possible top-10 finish. Here's why.
KANSAS CITY, Kansas — As the NASCAR Cup Series heads to Kansas Speedway this Sunday, Todd Gilliland may not be the first driver you think of but you may want to keep him in mind for a possible top-10 finish.
Gilliland is coming off of a strong, sixth-place finish at Bristol Motor Speedway. His first top-10 finish of the 2026 Cup Series season came on the heels of crew chief Chris Lawson making a sharp two-tire call that secured the No. 34 team track position for the final 110 laps.
“We were talking with our team owner [Bob Jenkins] and everyone about how it was a much-needed good run," Gilliland said. "Honestly, Bristol has never been my best track, so to get out of there with a top 10 and just to run really competitively the second half of that race felt really good."
The strong finish moved Gilliland up to 26th in points, up nine positions from where he was after each of the first two races of the season.
“Getting through Daytona and Atlanta, I think I wrecked five times in those two races and you know that can happen going into those two races and we were literally last in points after those. Obviously, we could have had great weeks and been on the top coming out of those, so I think that was just a tough place to start," Gilliland said.
Since then, Gilliland has been up and down the standings. First, he jumped up to 26th in points after a 12th-place finish at Phoenix, then fell to 31st after a slow, 34th-place finish at Las Vegas and slowly got back to 26th after finishing 23rd at both Darlington and Martinsville before getting sixth at Bristol.
"To be honest, we really haven’t had great speed. Even going to a place like Martinsville, where I feel that’s more so where we should run inside the top 10 than a place like Bristol, and we just ran in the back half of the twenties all day," Gilliland said.
Teammates Zane Smith and Noah Gragson have had their moments, particularly Smith who started the year with two top-10 finishes and a stage win at Daytona, but the team is still looking for speed as the drivers sit 22nd and 31st in points.
Like other teams, Front Row Motorsports has had to adjust their setups to the lower downforce, higher horsepower package featured in five of the last six races.
"This is an always moving target," Gilliland said. We got to a point where we have a lot of notes and you still can go off those notes to some extent, but, at the same time, things are a little bit different. I think we’re just barely missing it with these new targets we’re shooting for and with how tight the fields are now, it hasn’t been equating to great speed.”
Kansas Speedway is a little more of what everyone has been used to in recent years with the same package that has been run there in every season with the NextGen car.
However, Goodyear has evolved the tire compound to be softer with the intention of producing more falloff in an effort to create more passing.
Gilliland anticipates the earlier date's cooler weather will also help that cause.
"I think all the work Goodyear has been doing has been super helpful. The last four years now it’s been just a continuous progression of all that stuff," Gilliland said. "We just started watching some Kansas stuff, but it’s gonna be cooler this weekend. Speeds are gonna be up. I don’t think we had a ton of tire issues on the right sides, so I’m sure teams will keep pushing it, but the more the tires have been wearing out, it seems like at these places, it becomes easier to pass."
Gilliland finished 12th in both Kansas races last year. Gilliland also finished 14th in the spring race in 2024, meaning he could extend his streak of top-15 finishes in the spring race to three in a row this weekend.
Beyond Kansas, Gilliland has Mother's Day weekend circled for a trip to the Finger Lakes of New York and the 2.45-mile road course there. Out of every track type, Gilliland has finished inside the top-10 more frequently on road courses and street courses than any other track type he's competed on.
Again, the new package will greet him there.
“I’m excited for Watkins Glen. Obviously, going there earlier in the year is gonna be different, and then with the new horsepower and downforce package, I guess this is the first time I’ve really thought about it, but going up through the esses when you’re already right on the edge. You’re loose one direction and loose the other and you’re almost wide-open, where now I think you’ll see a lot more movement in cars and there will be some cars that are better through there than others," Gilliland said.
He believes this will open the door for more passing in some places it hasn't been as possible before.
"In my opinion, it might open up passing into the bus stop more. In years' past once you got out of turn one, you kind of settled in a line going to the esses, like you’re so much on-throttle time that it’s kind of hard to get a good run on guys into the bus stop, so I think that will be an improvement for the racing at Watkins Glen and then as the tires wear out you’ve got to be smooth and at least keep the tire wear in the back of your mind all day," Gilliland said.
Through everything, he has Smith and Gragson to lean on as not only teammates but friends away from the racetrack. For instance, after meeting with the media this week, Gilliland had a game of golf planned with them.
"My relationship with my teammates I think is the best friendship as teammates I’ve ever had by far because I’ve known these guys forever and we have a lot of fun. To me, I think that really brings our teams closer together as well," Gilliland said. "If you see your drivers getting along and hanging out, I think it just makes all of the communication around the shop a little bit better.
"Obviously, I don’t know that it equates to results because we haven’t been running great but I would like to think it helps just for the whole camaraderie of our shop."
A sixth-place finish at Bristol, followed by a track that played host to a pair of 12th-place finishes last year and then a track where he finished second in the fall is certainly a pathway for Gilliland's team, at least, to turn things around in 2026.