Who Is NASCAR Star Tony Stewart's Wife? All About NHRA Driver Leah Pruett — and Why He's Stepped Into Her Place on the Racing Circuit

Tony Stewart and his wife, Leah Pruett, have been married since 2021, and now they’re starting a family.

The racing couple first announced they were expecting in June 2024. Their son, Dominic James, was born on Nov. 17, 2024.

Stewart, a three-time NASCAR champion and Hall of Famer, met Pruett, a two-time NHRA world champion, right before the COVID-19 pandemic. The two bonded while in lockdown over their love for and dedication to racing.

“It’s nice to be with somebody who is also involved in racing and understands it," Stewart said in a January 2021 episode of the Stewart-Haas Radio podcast. "Understands the demands and the pressures and stresses, and it goes the other way too.”

Several months later, Pruett and Stewart announced their engagement on social media. "He might run in circles but he is a straight shooter and the salt of this Earth," Pruett wrote in an Instagram post. "Looking forward to a lifetime of sunrises and sunsets that the Lord has gifted us together."

So who is Tony Stewart's wife? Here's everything to know about Leah Pruett and her relationship with the racer.

She started racing when she was 8 years old

Pruett began racing in Junior Dragsters when she was just 8 years old, according to Autoweek. She’s been dedicated to her career in drag racing ever since, earning 18 career victories before stepping away from racing to focus on building a family.

She told Mobile 1 in July 2024 that her love of motorsports came from her father.

“A small automotive repair shop is what we owned, growing up, and that’s what I worked in, so I always loved cars,” she said. After seeing a national event at 12, she said, “I knew I wanted to be a part of this mechanical ballet.”

They were both in a relationship when they met

Stewart spoke about his first time meeting Pruett on the Dale Jr. Download podcast in March 2023, saying they were introduced by fellow racer Don “the Snake” Prudhomme, who told Stewart, “You need to meet, Leah.” Stewart admitted, “I knew exactly which Leah he was talking about.”

At the time, Stewart was engaged to model Pennelope Jimenez, and Pruett was married to racer Gary Pritchett. Pruett and Pritchett were married in 2013, and she was also previously married to Monster truck driver Todd LeDuc.

Stewart confirmed that nothing started between the two until they’d each ended their relationships. “I canceled my engagement, Leah had gotten separated and was in the process of getting divorced,” he said on the podcast.

Stewart then recalled driving six hours through the night from Alabama to Florida to meet Pruett for lunch in Gainesville, Fla. “She texted, ‘Are you really coming?’ I took a picture of the speedometer, I was running 90 [mph] in a 48,000-pound motor home ... down the interstate,” Stewart said.

The two went on an all-day excursion to watch bike races in Daytona, Fla., and when they got back at 5 a.m., Stewart remembered thinking, “That was different.”

They started dating in quarantine

Pruett and Stewart began their relationship at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Stewart shared on the Dale Jr. Download podcast that he and Pruett were going to attempt to drive Route 66 together in his mobile home after their first meeting.

“I was just going to go by myself, but then she goes, ‘Well, I’m in,’ I'm like, that’s even better,” he said.

They realized that the drive might face too many complications due to the start of the pandemic, but they still wanted to see each other, so Pruett invited Stewart to spend time with her and a group of friends at her home in Lake Havasu, Ariz.

“I went for four days, four days turned into four and a half straight months,” Stewart said.

They got engaged and married in 2021

The pair announced their engagement in March 2021, with Stewart writing on X, “So excited to spend the rest of my life with a truly amazing woman. She’s motivated, hard working, funny as hell, and as dedicated to her sport as anyone I’ve ever known. Love you babe.”

Eight months later, Stewart and Pruett got married. The NASCAR star shared some photos and videos from the special day in an end-of-year recap the following month.

“My greatest highlights of 2021... or any year for that matter?" he wrote in the caption. "The day I asked @Leah.Pruett to marry me and the day we said our vows. I'm a lucky man. What a year it's been."

Stewart and Pruett welcomed their first child three years after their wedding

Stewart and Pruett announced that they were starting a family in a movie trailer-themed post on Facebook in June 2024.

“I’m so excited to start a family with this incredibly beautiful love of my life Leah Pruett," Stewart wrote in the caption. "Can’t wait to meet this little guy."

Their son, Dominic James, was born on Nov. 17, 2024. Stewart raced back to Arizona where Pruett was in labor after attempting to qualify in the In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals in Pomona, Calif.

Just four hours after Pruett gave birth, Stewart flew back to Pomona to compete in the semi-finals, before returning to Arizona later that day.

“The short three hours that I go to spend with [Dominic] overnight, you couldn’t put a price tag on it. I would do it all over again for that little boy and for my wife and for our family," he said in a video after the race. "I didn’t win a championship. I didn’t win a race today, but I feel like I put today in the category of wins and championships.”

She spearheaded policy change to benefit female drivers

In 2024, Pruett stepped away from racing, with Stewart taking her place while she was pregnant. In an effort to make the transition easier for other women, the driver worked toward making a change in the NHRA’s driver replacement policy to arrange a replacement in the event one has to leave for medical reasons, without a time limit and without losing points and sponsorships, per the NHRA.

Pruett said she got involved in the policy change after evaluating her own love of racing with her desire to start a family.

“There were really not a lot of options in regard to having a family and racing at the same time,” she said. “My body needed time, and whether it was two months or six months or a couple of years, I couldn’t plan my life or my racing career because I didn’t know what my body was going to do.”

She plans to return to racing

Pruett told the NHRA in September 2024 that she “definitely plans to return to driving,” but isn't sure when.

"For the public, for the fans, for the partners, they can expect to see Tony Stewart start the 2025 season just as he did the 2024 season," Pruett told Autoweek that same month. Stewart, who took over for Pruett in 2024, isn’t in any hurry to get out of her seat soon, either. “Tony loves NHRA drag racing, and I don't want to get him out,” she added.

Pruett also expressed a desire to spend time focusing on motherhood, saying, "Tony thought for sure I was getting back in the seat in 2025. But my gut, myself, I know that I'm going to want to do the best job I can being a mom before I can get back in that seat."

However, Pruett has kept busy in the sport, helping to organize Stewart’s drag racing team, and hinted at the possibility of continuing her career down that path, admitting that she enjoys managing a team, as well.

“If my passion has always been just in driving, I’d be out of luck, but it’s not," she told Mobil 1. "I love what I get to do in the crew chief lounge with my team.”

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