Williams Lake Nascar Canadian Tire Series driver Ryley Seibert is looking to drum up some more support in an effort to win this year’s most popular driver award.
The winner, who will be vetted the title of Nascar Canadian Tire Series’ Most Popular Driver 2013, will be honoured at the Nascar Night of Champions Awards on Saturday, Dec. 14 at the Charlotte (N.C.) Convention Centre Ballroom in the Nascar Hall of Fame.
Seibert, who racked up several prestigious awards throughout the season including the Dodge/Mopar-Powered Quick Three Award seven times, the VTech Free Pass Award and Rookie of the Race five times, currently sits 326 votes behind first-place driver Louis-Philippe Dumoulin in second place with 3,524 total votes.
“The fans have been very supportive of me through this season, both through the highs and the lows,” Seibert said. “I’m hoping they will continue their support by casting their vote.”
Typically, the most popular driver of the year award is dominated by eastern drivers.
“The eastern provinces have huge support for their athletes but I’m hoping with a combined group effort we can have a driver from the west win,” he said, noting a vote for him is also a vote for his team (crew chief Keenan Magnant and crew members Brendon Kohnke, Cory Price, Ryan MacLauren, Jeff Stenbacher, Julie Bellai, Les Bellai and Trevor Seibert).
“We are a small team. Our funding comes from local ‘ma and pa’ shops and all of our crew is comprised of dedicated volunteers.
“If something breaks, we are the ones that have to fix it on our own time. We don’t have the luxury of having a full-time crew whose sole purpose is to maintain the car.
“A win would be a great representation of drivers and teams who still have to put on their work boots come Monday morning.”
Voting is free, no sign up is required, and can be done daily by visiting http://hometracks.nascar.com/2013_Most-Popular-Driver-Poll_NCATS_presented_by_Mobil-1.
Voting in the contest ends at 8:59 p.m. on Nov. 17.