Peyton Sellers scored his 68th career victory and third of the season at South Boston Speedway in tonight’s 125 lap contest, beating out who else but Trevor Ward.
Sellers trailed Ward for the opening half of the event but never let the No. 77 out of reach. He would make his move with around 70 laps to go, the two would put on a classic South Boston show. Eventually Sellers would prevail and never look back.
“I tell ya, I thought Trevor was in another time zone that first half,” Sellers said on the FloRacing broadcast “Once the track got oiled down the top groove kind of went away a little bit and my car was hooking on the bottom. To get the kind of grip we were getting off the bottom and launch off, I was able to use the throttle hard every lap.”
With Saturday’s victory, Sellers closed the gap on Ward and Pembelton in the championship standings heading into the South Boston 200.
“We’ve been off a little bit this year,” Sellers said “We might not have been the best cars several races we’ve won this year but we were the best car here right now and that’s all that matters leading into the 200 lapper and that’s a big night for all of us.”
Trevor Ward continues to be the model of consistency with only one finish outside the top 3. He retains his championship lead with a runner-up tonight.
“Believe it or not I’m happy with a 2nd tonight,” Ward told FloRacing “I felt bad. We got to racing real hard right there with Peyton and I kind of bumped wheels with him and I hated that. I felt like that might’ve knocked the toe off on mine but hey, that’s part of racing. Looking forward to building this notebook for the 200 and going after that crown jewel.”
The championship battle heated up quite literally just 42 laps in when Landon Pembelton went up in smoke and flames, reminiscent of the South Boston 200 laps season. Normally a racecar engulfed in flames means day over. Not for Pembelton. Under the red flag, the R&S team rectified the issue and went back out to salvage some points with an 11th place finish.
1) #26 Peyton Sellers
2) #77W Trevor Ward
3) #77H Landon S Huffman
4) #8W Conner Weddell
5) #6M Bobby McCarty
6) #1G Andrew Grady
7) #77S Blake Stallings
8) #77C Trey Crews
9) #4 Kyle Dudley
10) #17 Jason Myers
11) #0 Landon Pembelton
12) #12 Zach Peregoy
13) #51 Toby Layne
14) #0W Eric Winslow
