CONCORD, N.C. Tim McCreadie is back where it all started for him in dirt late model racing.

The Watertown, N.Y. driver came into the year looking for something new, and as it turns out, whats old is new again. For the first time in a decade, the 2006 World of Outlaws Late Models champion is a full-time member of The Most Powerful Late Models on the Planet.

Its exciting, its always nice to shake things up, McCreadie said. Sometimes youve got to look at doing different things and see if you can jumpstart some success. I just looked around at what Ive been doing and thought this seemed interesting. Kind of had our minds made up well before we decided to do it that we were looking to do something different, and here we are.

However, McCreadies schedule is far from the only thing thats changed in the past 12 months. Following the sudden departure of Hudson ONeal from Rocket1 Racing last spring, McCreadie vacated his longtime seat at Paylor Motorsports to run the remainder of the 2024 season with the Mark Richards-led operation.

But with Brandon Sheppard reuniting with Rocket1 after two seasons away, McCreadie went searching for a new home in the Late Model pits. That search led him to Boom Briggs.

Weve known each other a while, McCreadie said. Hes raced; Ive raced for many years. It just kind of worked out. He was looking at maybe scaling back a little and they still wanted to do some racing. It just worked out that I was available, and we decided to give it a try.

McCreadie acknowledged that Briggs experience behind the wheel is one of the main perks of having him as a car owner. The Pennsylvanian spent seven seasons on the road as a full-time World of Outlaws driver, achieving a career-best of second three times. Briggs still plans on strapping on a helmet on a part-time basis in 2025, ensuring he stays up to date on the nuances of a modern-day Late Model and can prepare the best machine possible for McCreadie.

Hes unique, he can still do it and drive, McCreadie said. When I worked with Vic Coffey, it was the same way. Vic could drive and could have all kinds of good feedback, and thats kind of what it is. Hes not afraid to do the work, so its exciting.

Of course, theres one change for 2025 thats visible as soon as cars roll onto the track each night for Hot Laps. McCreadie has brought back the No. 9 as a tribute to his father, Big Block Modified legend Barefoot Bob McCreadie.

Its been cool, McCreadie said. It warms your heart that people remember what my dad did and remember how fast he was, just all about it. I grew up watching this car my whole life, so it was kind of neat that we were able to do it. Weve just got to start putting it up further where it belongs instead of where were at.

The start of the 2025 campaign has been far from what McCreadie and Briggs were hoping for, but theres reason for optimism. McCreadie spent the vast majority of Saturdays Feature at Swainsboro Raceway in the top 10 before coming home in seventh his best run since DIRTcar Sunshine Nationals in January. The next stop on the schedule is Atomic Speedway next weekend, where hes won twice in 2006 and 2019.

With the Briggs Transport team showing signs of life going into the meat of the World of Outlaws season, McCreadie believes he is getting closer to the ultimate goal of doing what his dad did so many times put the No. 9 in Victory Lane.

Ive been all over, many different places and the goal is always to be up front and to do as good as you can, McCreadie said. Sometimes it doesnt seem to work out when you want it to, and then the goal is to work harder to get on top of that. So, the goals never changed. We didnt come over to the World of Outlaws to not try to fight for championships. We put ourselves in a hole, but its up to us to dig out.

McCreadie and the rest of the World of Outlaws Late Models will head to Atomic Speedway for the Fireball 50 on Friday and Saturday, April 4-5.