Frankie Muniz is ready to spend his time on the track as a full-time NASCAR driver.
The Malcolm in the Middle alumnus, 38, who began racing in 2004 and started his professional career in 2006, is joining Reaume Brothers Racing as a full-time driver of the No. 33 F-150 in the upcoming 2025 season of the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series.
“I don’t want to say it’s a long time coming, but this has been a dream of mine for forever,” he tells PEOPLE in an exclusive interview.
“I started with doing the open wheel route. I thought I was going to go IndyCar, kind of the Formula 1 route, but I always had in the back of my mind that I wanted to try NASCAR. I wanted to do it. I grew up watching NASCAR. I was a huge fan, but it’s not something I necessarily thought that I’d ever get the opportunity to do,” says Muniz.
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The announcement comes after Muniz competed in the ARCA Menards Series in 2023, in which he collected one top-five finish and 11 top-ten finishes, culminating in a fourth-place points finish at the end of the year. Since joining Ford Performance that same year, he has competed in limited races in both the NASCAR Xfinity Series and the Mustang Challenge Series.
The former child star says that joining “one of the three big national NASCAR series” full-time is “really exciting,” even though he knows he still has “a lot to prove to myself and to everybody.”
“I want people to know that I’ve literally dedicated my life to this,” he tells PEOPLE. “You know what I mean? I love it. When I’m not in the race car, I’m thinking about being in the race car. I’m training, I’m in the simulator at Ford, the Ford Performance Technical Center. I’m working with my engineers and my crew chiefs and the team and doing everything I can. Watching tape, watching past races at the racetracks I’m going to just to be as prepared as humanly possible.”
While Muniz says “closing the door” on acting has not been a “topic of discussion,” he’s busy “focusing on being a race car driver.”
“I hope to just prove to people that I can do both. That’s all I can do. I can’t, but I hope I do, and I’m hoping I can do it this season,” he tells PEOPLE, noting that he hopes his fans see him and his team “putting in the work.”
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“The kid from Malcolm in the Middle is racing in NASCAR. You know what I mean? And that’s what people say, but I am. I did it,” says Muniz, noting that he’s determined to “turn some heads.”
“I don’t want to just have made it to NASCAR — I want, when people think of the truck series, they think of NASCAR that they think of, oh, ‘I want to watch Frankie. He’s competitive. He’s this,’ ” he says. “So I’m doing everything I can.”
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