The Noaker family is in the business of racing. Since his karting days, Katie and Bob Noaker have spent their weekends with their son Robert, running their own team and supporting him on his path to becoming a professional driver.
The Robert Noaker Racing team name became synonymous with victory in the first two seasons of the Ford Mustang Challenge North America series, sweeping 12 wins over six weekends in 2025 and winning seven of 10 races in 2024.
Now partnered with Wheelhouse Motorsports in 2026, the team has adopted a new name, but the ingredients of the championship-winning team remain the same.
Speaking with the Noakers, they gave DSC an inside look at the work it takes off track and their dynamic as a racing family.
“We started this team because we didn’t know where Robert’s racing career was going to end up,” said Katie Noaker, team owner.
Due to racing’s unpredictable and difficult nature, starting out as a young driver requires a degree of luck and being at the right place at the right time to ensure a secure presence in the sport. By running the team themselves, the Noakers created an opportunity to fund their son’s career by giving customers a platform to race as well.
“We wanted to have something for Robert, I don’t want to say have a fallback, but have something if his driving career only goes so far and that’s it,” Katie said. “So we started the team as a way to get Robert to be able to race, and supplement that part with having customers.
“For two years [in Mustang Challenge], it was just Robert Noaker Racing, it was me, Bob and Robert.”
This season, Robert Noaker got the call to move up to the next step on the Ford driver development pyramid, competing in a GT4 Mustang in the Michelin Pilot Challenge IMSA series for McCumbee McAleer Racing.
Robert played a crucial role within the team while driving in Mustang Challenge. Now with his new opportunity taking priority, the Noakers were in need of some extra hands, in the form of Wheelhouse Motorsport.
“With Robert moving up to GT4 this year, he’s gone to the coaching side, so we weren’t sure how that was going to look in terms of working on the cars at the shop. So we were like, okay, we need to do something [different].”
Dan McKeever, owner of Wheelhouse Motorsports, ran with the Robert Noaker Racing team at the Le Mans Invitational last June in the Dark Horse Legends class. The proposal to join the two teams came from a casual question posed by Bob Noaker, which was met with sincere interest back in mid 2025.
“He ran really well [at Le Mans], super nice guy. So, I kind of messed around with him, saying, ‘Hey, do you want to own a Mustang Challenge team?’ He said, yeah, so then I’m like, oh, called my bluff. So that’s how it came about,” said Bob Noaker.
Building a partnership with Wheelhouse inadvertently put the Noakers in the perfect position to host Ford CEO Jim Farley as a special guest driver at Sebring, Laguna Seca, and Mid-Ohio, driving the #17 car.
“Last year, we were approached to have Jim [Farley] run with us, and then, you know, [Wheelhouse] had Jim run with them in the GT4 program and the WRL, so it worked out really well,” said Bob Noaker on how the relationship with Farley began.
The Wheelhouse team has treated his entries with the same intensity as it does with its full-season drivers, with Robert Noaker developing a personalised setup for him to run just as he does for Sandy Satullo, Will Lucas, Joseph Dederichs, and Tom Tait.
“Robert came up with a setup just for Jim [Farley], so Jim’s first time out [in the Dark Horse R], he came back in, and he goes, ‘This car is so much better than anything we’ve ever had,’ and I said, well, you can thank Robert for that!” Bob continued.
Robert Noaker’s continued involvement in the team now appears to be focused on developing specific setups for each driver, as well as one-on-one driver coaching, tailored to their preferences and driving style.
“All four cars are on different setups. These drivers are going to drive differently,” he said.
With the varied experience and class levels of their four drivers, ranging from up-and-comer Will Lucas and fellow Dark Horse class driver Sandy Satullo to the two Dark Horse Legends drivers who came to racing later in life, the Noakers work tirelessly to ensure each car and driver are taken care of each race weekend.
“Robert will come down every day and spend time with all four drivers, and then he’ll most likely give us the setup for each car, since he’s driven here before, so we rely heavily on him. And when he’s not here, I’ll do the setups based on what I know he has done in the past.”
The rub is that the team has difficulty using Noaker’s personal setup as an example because of the knife-edge he preferred to drive on, his father, Bob, says.
“The biggest problem we’ve been having is that Robert’s car drives so scary that the two kids struggle with driving the setup he used to be on. Robert actually spent a weekend testing to try to get a more comfortable setup for these two [Dark Horse class cars], and then we had to creep towards that other setup.
“They are getting there from Robert’s coaching, and we keep moving the setups in that direction.”
Having a proven two-time series champion driver helping hands-on with the car is a massive performance advantage. The scale of his dominance in 2024 and 2025 cannot be overstated. His success in the Dark Horse R is likely due to the team’s never-satisfied attitude toward extracting performance.
“What we’ve changed in [these cars were] perfectly fine. We just found a couple of things that could be a bit better.”
Robert and the Wheelhouse team have completed tests of the cars on their own dime, never asking their customers to pay out of pocket, even though they benefit directly from the data gathered, which is implemented for the entire team.
This is the kind of dedicated approach that makes the difference in racing in a one-make series.
“We don’t charge the customers; Robert actually pays for [testing] on his own. We spend a ton of money on this car to try to go three-tenths faster, where I guarantee no other team would do that.”
Speaking to the now-GT4 driver, he is very eager to share his young wisdom with the Wheelhouse drivers and give them as much driver coaching as he can, being so familiar with the Dark Horse R specifically around the tracks on the calendar this season.
“I don’t hold any secrets back. I just help them with the nuances of the track, and I try to focus on the racing side of it.
“It’s one thing to go out and do a fast lap, but it’s another to run fast around people and find the race craft side of it. Knowing where to pass, where not to pass, and where you need to defend from someone.
“Giving [the drivers] a hand on that, so they’re not out there trying to figure it out [in real time] where you need to defend the inside from someone. I can just say, hey, these are the spots you never let anyone get into this corner; that’s where I can really help them more than other people.”
As a driver in the Michelin Pilot Challenge and a driving coach for the Mustang Challenge, weekends like Watkins Glen, with both series on track, make for a busy schedule due to his immense dedication to both.
“The last two years, as soon as I got off the track and out of my car, I’d be [thinking] what do the other cars need for setup? What do the drivers need to be different?
“We’re thankful to have enough of a team around us to fill in most of those spots [this season]. Even now, [Michelin Pilot Challenge] practised this morning, and I came back over here to see who needs a hand with anything.”
The Wheelhouse Motorsports team is a well-oiled machine, having won two team championships in as many seasons. The dedication to its customers through testing, coaching, open communication, and logistics management makes it an incredibly attractive organisation to go racing with; it playing host for Ford’s CEO is a testament to that.
Having accomplished their goal of helping their son succeed, the Noaker family, along with the Wheelhouse team, is now pursuing bigger goals. Wheelhouse Motorsports now looks to maintain its momentum and help its drivers follow Robert’s lead, representing the team and the Ford brand with success in the Mustang Challenge series.
Images courtesy of Ford Racing & IMSA
