Growing up, Kayla Surles was always the type of athlete who wanted to prove her abilities on the field.

A swimmer, track runner and lacrosse player through middle and high school, Surles and her brother would go head-to-head in lacrosse, challenging the other to see who could score the most goals and do the most trick shots.

“We just wanted to prove that we are as good as other people say we are, we are as good as we say we are,” Surles said recently.

So, when the opportunity to potentially test an ARCA Menards Series car at Daytona International Speedway came about, Surles didn’t want to just be handed the ride. She wanted to prove she deserved it.

Surles, a 21-year-old from Fredericksburg, Virginia, works at Bugsy’s Repair, which is owned by Willie and Dinah Mullins. The Mullins’ also own an ARCA team, Mullins Racing, and were looking for a driver for the annual pre-race practice at Daytona.

“When Willie and Dinah were trying to decide if they wanted to put me in the first test, I told them, ‘Don’t put me in because of just me helping work on your cars. I want to be able to earn that,’” she said. “So I had the breakout season and they were like, ‘Well, you earned it.’”

Surles more than earned the chance thanks to her season last year at Dominion Raceway, a NASCAR-sanctioned 4/10-mile asphalt oval track in Thornburg, Virginia. She finished the 2022 season with six victories and was second in the track’s Modified division standings.

It’s no surprise Surles has found success behind the wheel, given her competitive nature. Ten years ago, she and her dad went to watch one of her friends race, and she instantly wanted to give the sport a try.

“I’m a super competitive kid and my friend started racing, and my dad said, ‘We’re going to go watch them race,’” she said. “And I wanted to beat my friends.

“My dad knew what he was getting into when he went to the race. He was prepared.”

Surles started racing in a dirt go-kart, and made the move to Modifieds about four years ago.

“One of my dad’s buddies bought an asphalt Modified and said, ‘You know what? Let’s put Kayla in it,’” she said. “That’s just sort of where the door opened up and that’s where we had people built up around us supporting the Modified, and it’s kind of where we’ve been put now.”

Surles races Modifieds for Ferry Farm Racing, a four-car team that also includes her younger brother, P.J., who drives a Bandolero.

She’s enjoyed helping be a coach to her brother and other young racers, both on her team and at Dominion.

“There’s a little girl named Addy at the race track. She calls me her mentor because about the time she started racing Bandoleros is about the time we were trying to get my brother in a Bandolero,” Surles said. “At first I just kind of took her underneath my wing because she got on the track first and we got her up to speed really quick. Now it’s time to focus on P.J. and all that.

“Racing is all about trying to get new fans in the stands, trying to get young drivers back in it, and it’s a huge family aspect of it,” she said.

She’s perfecting the Modified, but Surles wants to be the type of driver who can race anything. She’s learning from her driver coach Davey Callihan, a former Modified and Limited Late Model driver who now competes in Dominion’s Late Model Stock Car division.

Getting more confident at the track and better at qualifying had a lot to do with Surles’ breakout season.

“I used to not be able to qualify at all,” she said. “So I definitely learned how to qualify, so we’ll be taking that into next season.

“Just kind of, like, being able to weave through the traffic a little bit quicker is what I learned last year because I used to be too patient or too antsy, and it would cause problems. But I definitely got that down last year, the perfect go-time and how to be patient, so I’m looking forward to taking that into this season.”

Being an all-around racer is why Surles is adding Limited Late Models to her slate this summer at Dominion, and why she was so excited to get a chance to get on the track at Daytona.

Testing at Daytona was “awesome,” she said, especially because she spent a short time living about 20 minutes north of the track when she was younger.

The day did have a scary moment, though.

“I had a bit of a scare when drafting because someone accidentally hit the kill switch,” she said.

“I don’t know how fast I was going, but it was going to be a heck of a lap. It was the most RPMs we had really seen from that car all day because I had a huge run coming down the backstretch, so I was still able to put up a 50 second lap time with me having to slam on the brakes and avoid disaster.

“I saw my boss’s face flash before my eyes,” she added. “I was like, ‘Oh no!’”

Surles will open her Modified season this weekend at Dominion.

She plans to run for the full season and go for a Modified championship at Dominion while also competing in the track’s Limited Late Model division part-time.

Surles will also compete in the Busch Light and Women in Motorsports North America racing program that provides contingency funds for women who accumulate points throughout the 2023 season.

Coming off of her season last year, Surles is feeling confident that she can hopefully expand on her success and go for track championship.

Racing returns to Dominion Raceway this Saturday night at 7 p.m. ET.

No matter what type of car he is racing, Brandon Ward finds a way to win.

Ward’s career has seen him take home checkered flags in Late Model Stocks, Super Late Models, Modifieds, the USAR Pro Cup Series and the NASCAR Goody’s Dash Series, all of which has helped him build a reputation as one of the most versatile drivers in the country.

Since the mid-2010s, Ward has been a regular in the famous Modified division at Bowman Gray Stadium. Ward has emerged as one of the track’s better Modified competitors during that time, but the seasoned veteran is determined to parlay that consistency into his first championship at the Madhouse.

“We’re coming off a runner-up in the points last year, and we’ve all worked very hard over the winter,” Ward said. “Two new cars got built, and there are a lot of new things going, so there’s a lot of new excitement. I really feel like all of it is going to build up and result in a pretty good season for us [at Bowman Gray].”

MADHOUSE: A FloRacing film on Bowman Gray Stadium

As to why he primarily competes in Modifieds at Bowman Gray today, Ward admitted that scenario happened by accident.

After bouncing around several different disciplines during the 2000 that included winning a title in the UARA STARS Late Model Series in 2006, Ward joined his current team in New Day Motorsports, owned by Jeff Day and Kevin Powell, at the turn of the decade.

Ward’s tenure with New Day Motorsports initially started with him explicitly focusing on Super Late Model competition, all while Powell ran a part-time schedule in his Modified at Bowman Gray. The status quo remained in place until one fateful evening in the mid-2010s when Ward climbed into Powell’s Modified after the latter broke his scapula.

It would not take long for Ward to showcase the same efficiency in Modifieds that had followed him in every form of racing up to that point.

Today, Ward is a household name amongst the Bowman Gray faithful with his familiar No. Q104 Modified sponsored by local iHeartRadio station Q104.1. He added the electric presence provided by the fans creates an atmosphere at Bowman Gray unlike any other in the country — which in turn benefits him, New Day Motorsports and his sponsors.

When it comes to racing at Bowman Gray, Ward admitted there is only so much of his own experience he can apply on a given night.

The narrow design of the track creates plenty of challenges for drivers to progress through the field, but Ward said the unique schedule put together by the track each year excels at simultaneously keeping drivers vigilant and entertaining the crowd.

“The whole dynamic of Bowman Gray being a quarter-mile track around a football stadium is just so much different than anything I’ve ever done,” Ward said. “You also have races that can be 25 laps or 200 laps. There are also full field redraws some weeks, so there’s a lot of variation week to week you don’t see anywhere else.”

With the tight corners and diverse race lengths comes on-track tempers that have come to define weekly racing at Bowman Gray.

Like nearly every driver who has competed at the Madhouse, Ward has been on each end of contact that has evoked an emotional response out of one or both parties involved. Those situations can sometimes be unavoidable for Ward depending on the race, which only puts more emphasis on him keeping a level head from flag to flag.

RELATED: Watch live Bowman Gray racing all year on FloRacing

Powell had advised Ward on how heated racing at Bowman Gray can get when he first climbed into his car, but he knew Ward would gradually find his comfort zone and become someone who could contend for victories on a regular basis.

The experience Ward brings to racing in general is why Powell believes New Day Motorsports can win a championship at Bowman Gray this year. But he stressed the quality of Ward’s character has also been instrumental in their program’s growth.

“When it came time to pick somebody to hold our steering wheel, it was important for me and Jeff to judge someone based on their character, capacity and attitude,” Powell said. “Brandon had proved himself long before he got to us that he was an incredible race car driver, but Brandon’s ability to represent us perfectly on and off the track shines through more than we could ever ask.”

Powell is proud of how the partnership between him, Ward and Day that started over a decade ago has blossomed into an organization that includes a 15,000 square foot race shop, four Modifieds and a second team that will be driven by Daniel Beeson during the 2023 season at Bowman Gray.

The progress made over the offseason alone has Powell cautiously optimistic New Day Motorsports can finally claim a Bowman Gray title, yet as a track veteran, he understands circumstances within and outside of the team’s control must line up perfectly to make that dream a reality.

For Ward, winning a championship will come down to more than just luck, as he must best the two drivers who have dominated Bowman Gray since the 2000s in Burt Myers and Tim Brown.

The duo has earned 22 track championships between them, with Brown leading the all-time list in 12 titles with Myers behind him in second with 10. Although Ward was consistent and managed to win a race last year, Brown still claimed the championship by 21 points over him despite not visiting Victory Lane once.

With both Brown and Myers expected to be favorites for the Bowman Gray crown once again, Ward said there is no margin of error for him and New Day Motorsports as they pursue their first title together.

“You have to be on your game,” Ward said. “Your cars need to be right, and you can’t make mistakes inside the car. [Brown and Myers] both have a lot of laps [at Bowman Gray], so no matter what, they are two cars you will have to beat. The racetrack also changes every week, so you have to stay on top of everything.”

Powell added that if anyone can dethrone the dominance of Brown and Myers, Ward is the most capable of doing so.

The aggressive-but-smart mindset of Ward behind the wheel allows him to maximize his points regardless of the race format at Bowman Gray, but Powell said obtaining strong track position and putting together another consistent, clean season are two factors that will dictate whether Ward is able to celebrate a track title at the end of the year.

“Last year, we completed every single lap at [Bowman Gray],” Powell said. “We had no mechanical failures whatsoever, so our goal is to complete every single lap. Secondarily, we have to qualify up front, especially on the Twin 25 nights. You also need to have lady luck on your side just a bit, but if we start up front and make smart decisions, we can win races.”

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Having now raced at Bowman Gray for more than half a decade, Ward is itching to finally earn that prestigious Modified title at the facility and sees the 2023 season as the perfect chance to do so.

The chemistry Ward has developed with Powell and Day over the years has culminated into New Day Motorsports’ current efficiency, so to have the program immortalized as Modified champions at the Madhouse would be a tremendous honor for him and everyone involved.

“Any race win or championship is big, and that’s what we’re doing this for,” Ward said. “Bowman Gray has such a huge following, and we were so close last year. I felt like we had an off year honestly, so I’m hoping we can get back to where we need to be with the cars. It would be huge to win this championship, not just for myself but for this entire New Day Motorsports team.”

Many long, grueling nights are ahead for the Modified class at Bowman Gray, but Ward is not worried in the slightest about rising to the occasion and adding his name to the list of champions in the track’s storied history.

Because no matter what type of car he is racing, Brandon Ward finds a way to win.