Danville native back behind the wheel in NASCAR Nationwide Series

Peyton Sellers sat outside of his Late Model Series car at South Boston Speedway on July 2 and had to laugh at the fact his engine failed during a practice run. It was just bad luck as the 25-year-old put it, which was a change of pace to the high he was on.

Coming off a career-best 15th-place finish at Milwaukee Speedway on June 20, the Danville native will be back behind the wheel of his Nationwide Series car for three consecutive race weekends, beginning with tonight’s running of the Kroger 200 at O’Reilly Raceway Park in Indianapolis, a track he has never competed at before.

“Everybody tells me it’s like a mix between Irwindale and Orange County, a little bit,” Sellers said. “With that in mind, I’ve run good at both of those tracks. I’m looking forward to it, and I’ve been very fortunate to have a lot of luck in short track racing. That’s kind of what I grew up doing and we go from there to Iowa, which is another track I’ve typically run good at in the East Series.”

In the past two years, Sellers has been in contention for a win at the Toyota All-Star Showdown at Irwindale Speedway, finishing second to Sprint Cup Series driver Joey Logano in 2008 and then being wrecked while leading on the final turn of the final lap by Logano in the same race in January.

Sellers has run two races at Iowa Speedway in the Camping World East Series. In 2007, he started second and finished 21st after engine problems. The following year, he finished 11th, on the lead lap, after starting in the third spot.

“Track is position is everything. You’ve got to qualify up front to race up front,” Sellers said. “That bit us a little bit at Milwaukee. We got way too loose in qualifying and we had a good car and just screwed up in qualifying, got too loose. That’s part of the game. We were having to fight back and we didn’t have that track position all night and I think we’ll be better when it comes to ORP. We’ll know what to do and what not to do.”

Earlier in the month, Sellers and Cardinal Motorsports announced that primary sponsor SFP added an 11th race to the schedule, the Aug. 8 running of the Zippo 200 at Watkins Glen International.

“We’re looking forward to it. SFP actually came on board … and said they’d like to do Watkins Glen also in a few weeks,” Sellers said. “Getting to a road course is going to be good for me since I grew up at places like VIR. Looking forward to getting back on a road course. I’ve had pretty good luck in the East Series at the road courses.”

The added race at Watkins Glen, paired with the two short tracks, will allow Sellers to get a feel for what it is like to run on a weekly basis with the top drivers in the Nationwide Series — a huge jump from his days driving in the East Series.

“It’s a different ballgame,” Sellers said. “I can’t tell people how competitive it is and how much money there is, to be honest with you. There’s just so many good teams out there well-funded and it’s hard to show up once a month and run with those guys. I’ve got a greater learning curve running once a month and so does the team.”