SHINNSTON, W.Va. — Brandon Sheppard and Rocket1 Racing are taking on a new challenge this season.
The four-time World of Outlaws Late Model Series champion and team owner Mark Richards have decided to chase the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series championship. Having competed in every race for both series thus far this season, Sheppard leads the Lucas Oil standings and ranks a close third in the World of Outlaws points.
Sheppard has won four Lucas late model features this season and one with the World of Outlaws.
“The past few years we’ve come out of Speedweeks either atop the Lucas Oil points or near the top of the standings. This year was the same, and after Speedweeks we had a meeting as a team to discuss if we wanted to try something different this year, and it was a unanimous decision to go after the Lucas Oil title,” said team owner Mark Richards. “The World Racing Group and the World of Outlaws have been great to us over the past several years and we are grateful for all the support they’ve shown us. We’re just to a point that it was time to shuffle the deck and try something new, and who knows, next year we might be back chasing a World of Outlaws Late Model Series championship.”
Sheppard and Richards are looking forward to visiting some different tracks.
“I think the most exciting aspect for our team is that we’ll get to run some events and visit some tracks this year that either we haven’t been to in a long time or maybe we’ve never even been to,” Richards said. “We are going to put everything we’ve got into getting our first Lucas Oil championship this year.”