Ryan Shattuck Wins SELLM Championship

MYRTLE BEACH, SC :: Ryan Shattuck won the 2014 Southeast Limited Late Model (SELLM) Championship by virtue of his fifth place finish in Sunday night’s race.  The championship was his first in a Late Model in his first season running in a Late Model.

Entering the race, Shattuck had a pretty significant deficit to series points leader Bradley McCaskill, but McCaskill got swept up in a late race accident in Sunday’s 100 lap race at Myrtle Beach Speedway while Shattuck slipped through the mayhem and scored a top-five finish – his second top-five finish in the three races that constitute the SELLM schedule.

“It means a lot,” Shattuck said of winning the championship.  “Being the first year racing, it was kind of like the dream that maybe we could win that championship.  For it to happen is unreal being new to the car and series and that learning curve we were able to accomplish pretty well.”

Prior to racing in a Late Model, Shattuck was a championship driver in the smaller Legends and Bandolero cars, winning national championships in Legends cars as well as winning a Bandolero championship at Charlotte Motor Speedway’s Summer Shootout.

Shattuck first came on to the Limited Late Model scene in 2013 when he scored a second place finish in the 2013 SELLM Challenger race at Myrtle Beach and following that up with a fourth place finish in the SELLM Pro race two days later.  This season, Shattuck scored three wins in a Limited Late Model at Caraway Speedway with his first career win coming on May 31^st.  Those wins gave Shattuck the confidence he needed as a driver to know that he can compete in the bigger cars.

“It was huge on confidence,” Shattuck remarked.  “It made me realize I can do it and run with some great drivers like Mack Little and it boosted confidence and I think we went out and won two more and that was great as well and helped me develop myself for this Southeast Limited series.”

Despite his confidence, he didn’t feel that the championship was a realistic possibility after falling out of the second SELLM race of the season a couple weeks ago at Caraway Speedway.

“Going in to the race, I really didn’t think it was a possibility,” he explained.  “We were pretty far back.  Bradley would’ve had had to have some unfortunate luck.  I hate it for him.  Really, our goal was to run as well as we could and contend for the win.  The championship was an extra bonus.  We went down there thinking, let them know we’re there for contention and come away with the best finish we could.  Fifth was a really good place to end up after starting 17^th – especially with the race being cut 25 laps short.”

Shattuck’s 2015 plans have not yet been finalized.  He says he’s looking at different options and hoping for more sponsorship packages so he can have a better season in 2015.