Devin Moran had been due. Not just for his first Firecracker 100 victory, but for a victory of any kind.
The reigning Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series champion entered Saturday winless in his previous 20 starts — including 12 tour races — since his April 24 triumph at Georgetown (Del.) Speedway, an unusual drought for one of the sport's most consistent front-runners.
Moran emphatically ended it Saturday at Lernerville Speedway.
The 31-year-old from Dresden, Ohio, tracked down race-long leader Brandon Sheppard and led 19 of the final 20 circuits of the 100-lap feature to capture his long-awaited first Firecracker 100 victory in his seventh career start in the crown jewel.
The way Moran earned the $50,000 payday — turning back Sheppard's furious challenges on laps 93 and 95, when the Rocket1 Racing driver twice pulled alongside exiting turn four before Moran answered each time, after Sheppard officially reclaimed the lead on lap 91 — made the triumph all the sweeter.
"Hell yeah, baby! Let's go!" Moran shouted, his first words to FloRacing pit reporter Ben Shelton after climbing from his car in victory lane.
Moran, who earned his first $50,000 payday since bagging $53,000 in the 2024 Silver Dollar Nationals at Huset’s Speedway in Brandon, S.D., had been close at the Firecracker before. His bid for victory went by the wayside last year when he had to pit from fourth on lap 59. In 2024, he finished runner-up to Ricky Thornton Jr., a distant 12 seconds behind — but Moran did so from the 16th-starting spot.
On Saturday, nobody adapted to the ever-changing track conditions like Moran, who made most of his ground up around the top of turns one and two before needing to improvise down the stretch when the upper groove faded away.
“I was really using one and two really, really good. And then, from like the center off, it went over the crown, so I couldn't use it no more,” Moran said. “So I felt like I lost a lot of speed. And yeah, I was just watching (crew chief) Chuck (Kimble) the entire time, trying to just take Sheppy's air from him a couple times. I know I got close, and I chopped him, but that's what you gotta do to win the Firecracker, you know?”
Moran never truly entered the winning conversation until lap 48 when he dispatched Dan Ebert for second. Not long earlier — on lap 32 — he had slipped from the fourth-starting spot to seventh. A lap-31 caution for Mike Marlar allowed Moran to regroup, though, and make up that lost ground.
That’s when Moran worked the high side seemingly better than any driver, even Sheppard, the early leader who settled into the middle of the racetrack for a large majority of Saturday’s 100-lapper. At one point, Sheppard had built a 2.6-second lead over Moran on lap 60 — eight laps following a lap-52 restart for Thornton Jr., who slowed out of sixth.
Moran had cut that down to a half-second, though, once Sheppard reached traffic before Clay Harris drew the lap-75 caution. From there, Sheppard just didn’t have enough to finish the job — and he has a hunch as to why.
“(Moran) did a good job there. I was passing some lapped cars using that line. It got to where I couldn’t steer across the center very good — I think that’s because I had a soft tire on the right-front, I don’t really know,” Sheppard said. “Couldn’t steer into the center as good, so I was having to diamond my corner off a little bit. After he passed me, that got me right back to him there. Yeah, my car was really good. I probably could’ve did a few things different — maybe it would’ve changed the outcome, maybe not.”
For Sheppard, it’s another tantalizingly close finish in a crown jewel event. He finished second in May 24’s Show-Me 100 at Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Mo., and had challenged eventual Dream XXXII winner Bobby Pierce in June 6’s 100-lapper at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio, before a right-front tire failure on lap 80.
“We’re just thankful to be up here on the podium,” Sheppard added. “I hate it for my team — to lead that many laps and lose it late there. It is what it is now.”
Moran, meanwhile, called Saturday’s Firecracker victory “extraordinary.” He also added that his Double Down Motorsports team relied on an older but trusty race car to get them out of their mounting slump.
“This is our car we've had for a couple years, and it's been a really, really good race car,” Moran said. “We’ve just had our ups and downs, and we knew if we got this car out, we'd run good, and that's what we've done. I think this car's only ran outside the top five, like two or three times.
“So, just want to thank them guys, my amazing crew. Chucky, Houston (Null), Dyla (Morando) — this is Dylan's home track, so he had some few choice words if we won for the night. So I'd say we’ll be hanging out, having a good time.”
Moran and his crew planned to make the three-hour trek home to Dresden, Ohio, immediately after the feature, but those plans quickly changed.
"We were planning on leaving tonight," Moran said with a smile. "But I'd say that white hauler over there is gonna have to hang out for a little while and enjoy these fans."