Peyton Sellers spent most of the 2015 racing season on the road, competing in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. This season he’s coming home.
Sellers, a former NASCAR Whelen All-American Series national champion, said late last week he plans to race at South Boston Speedway on a regular basis in 2016.
“The love of racing, wanting to race every week,” Sellers said of his decision to return to South Boston. “Weekly racing is pure racing. The best guy wins, not the guys with the most money.”
After winning the South Boston Speedway Late Model Stock track championship in 2014, Sellers made just two starts at his home track in 2015 while racing in 16 Xfinity Series races. The 32-year-old Sellers also won the 2005 South Boston title.
Sellers said there is always an outside chance he could return to the road this year if everything fell into place, but his only plans at present are to be at South Boston and run for the championship.
“South Boston is a natural for me. They have made a lot of good decisions in the off season,” said Sellers. “We had lost the middle-of-the-pack guys and they (track management) have done things that needed to be done to bring them back. I’m really looking forward to getting back over there this year.”
The “changes” Sellers referred to include a new two-tire rule, which prohibits teams from buying more than two tires a week, and an increase in the weekly purse, which guarantees a driver $500 a night.
Sellers believes the two-tire rule, which has been in place in the Limited Division for some time, could be a game-changer.
“It’s a whole new ball game this year. The track is the same, but you are going to see things equalize the field to make races closer. The end result is going to be to even the field,” said Sellers.
“There are going to be some guys moving up from Limited that are going to have an advantage for a while. We have been on four new tires a week for years. Those (Limited) guys are accustomed to two new tires. They are going to have an advantage of how to run the tires, where to put them on the car, how hard to run them. For me it’s going to be just a matter of making practice runs on two versus four.”
Sellers also thinks the rule changes will have a huge impact on car count in 2016.
“I think there will probably be 25 cars the first race, 22 at the second. I don’t think you will see a night with 12 cars. I think the average will be 18 or so,” said Sellers, who will be sponsored by Danville Toyota, Liquid Performance and St. Lawrence Radiology.
Sellers and most everyone else competing in 2016 will be on track Saturday for the annual open practice session. Practice begins at 10 a.m. and will run until 4 p.m. with a one-hour break for lunch from noon until 1 p.m. It is open to fans at no charge.
The South Boston regular season kicks off with the Danville Toyota NASCAR Whelen Late Model Twin 100s onMarch 12. There will also be a 50-lap Limited race, 30-lap Pure Stock race, 50-lap Modified race and a 15-lap Hornet race. Adult tickets are $10 while youth ages 7-12 are $5.
