SARVER, Pa. (June 27) — Mark Richards sat on a Jersey barrier in Lernerville Speedway's infield. Just in front him, his Rocket Chassis house car crew members quietly circled the team's parked No. 1 machine. And his driver, Brandon Sheppard, stood a few feet away, conducting an interview with FloRacing's Ben Shelton about his runner-up finish in Saturday's Firecracker 100.

There were no tears or displays of disgust from Richards and his Rocket1 group, but there was also no joy in Rocketville. This was a tough defeat for all of them to absorb.

"Second hurts worse than last sometimes," Sheppard said a bit later during postrace technical inspection in the pit area, "especially in these situations."

Sheppard, 33, of New Berlin, Ill., was the favorite entering the race after capturing a 25-lap semifeature on Friday and exerted his strength immediately, grabbing the lead from the outside at the initial green flag and dominating well into the second half of the 100-lapper. He appeared to be on his way to breaking through for his first Firecracker 100 victory in his eighth attempt.

But Devin Moran of Dresden, Ohio, rose up to challenge following a lap-75 restart and overtook Sheppard for the lead on lap 80. Despite dogging the 31-year-old Moran relentlessly for the rest of the way — even nosing ahead to officially lead lap 91 — Sheppard couldn't regain control and grudgingly settled for the $20,000 second-place check as Moran cashed the $50,000 top prize.

What went wrong? Where did Sheppard falter down the stretch? Why couldn't he maintain his edge to the finish?

Richards had an idea. While sitting glumly on the concrete wall as Moran celebrated in victory lane, the Rocket Chassis co-owner pointed to a difference in tire choice between the Sheppard and Moran vehicles.

"We just had softer tires on and at the end it got us in trouble, especially in (turns) three and four," Richards said. "In three and four we couldn't steer because was our right-front was softer than (Moran's). He had 3 on the right-front and left-rear. We had 2s on (the same corners). We both had (hard) 4 right rears.

"But in three and four it was killing us. That's where we were worst. It wasn't bad in one and two, but three and four, we was just was giving up too much time."

Watching from a spot inside turn three, Richards noticed Sheppard begin to struggle at the three-quarter mark of the feature.

"Well, after that restart (on lap 75)," Richards said. "That restart there is when it really starts showing up after it. I don't know whether the track sealed up more or what, but our right-front's pretty much pushed (worn) off."

Sheppard, however, wouldn't blame the tire selection.

"Yeah, I don't know," Sheppard said. "I'll have to go back and watch (the video), honestly. I mean, yeah, I got to where I couldn't steer there, especially in three and four, I got to where I couldn't hardly steer at all. But once he passed me, I stayed with him, so obviously we were good."

Indeed, more often than not, when a driver takes the lead late in a race they'll drive off from the field. That wasn't the case for Moran, who never could shake Sheppard through the waning stages.

Sheppard mused that running at the front for so many laps put him in the position of not knowing where the optimal lane was on the 4/10-mile oval, a track that's known for its highly technical nature with subtle surface shifts occurring during a long-distance affair.

"The lane changed … the line changed so much throughout the race there that I'd call it more one of them deals where, you know, you're leading the race and you don't know exactly where to be at," Sheppard said. "We've led for so long, and I was just trying to keep my speed up as good as I could and run the best line that I thought I could keep up my speed the best."

Sheppard paused: "He just got me."

Of course, Sheppard nearly got Moran back multiple times over the final 20 circuits. Moran slid Sheppard through turns one and two to go ahead and proceeded to ring the extreme outer lip of the wall-less corners for several laps, but he shifted lower when Sheppard drew close to challenge.

"Once he got by me there, you know, I seen what he was doing a little bit different than I was and I changed my line up," Sheppard said. "He was protecting some also. I mean, he moved to the bottom because I was coming back to him on the bottom. His (crew) guy told him to go to the bottom, which is, that's what you're supposed to do.

"And then I moved up, and then he moved up. Then he got to where he was running the bottom of one or two and the middle of three and four, and when he started doing that, there wasn't much I could do to get around him."

Sheppard looked to the outside of Moran off turn two several times. He pulled to Moran's inside down the frontstretch as well. But with Moran smartly running a line to protect and lapped traffic also periodically in the picture, Sheppard couldn't really even find an opportunity to throw a bomb at Moran entering a corner.

Was there a moment, a move, during the final stanza that Sheppard would have liked to redo?

"Honestly, I don't know. It's hard to say," Sheppard said. "We were right there, but it's one of them deals — bobbed when we should have weaved."

Richards wondered if perhaps Sheppard should have let it all hang out on the treacherous cushion in the closing laps. He noted that the track surface was "pretty balanced all the way across" and Sheppard wasn't being threatened by third-running Hudson O'Neal of Martinsville, Ind., so a last-ditch, gas-'er-up bid might have been possible.

"I just wanted him to run the top the last laps," Richards said. "It's hard to tell him (under green flag) though. I mean, I was pointing to him. I wanted him to run and just burn the top down because we was far enough ahead of Hudson, five or six seconds ahead of him, where we didn't have nothing to lose. So we should have just burnt the top down because (Moran) was starting to struggle a little bit down there in one and two."

Hindsight is 20-20, though, and Sheppard can't go back now to change his approach. He had to accept his runner-up finish, which bested his previous top Firecracker 100 finish of third in 2019 when he led the first 61 laps before fading slightly in a race won by a late-charging Tim McCreadie of Watertown, N.Y.

Sheppard was able to look at some positive sides to his performance.

"This is the best car we've had in the Saturday night show for sure," said Sheppard, who has made all eight of his Firecracker 100 starts driving for the Rocket1 team. "That's why it's so disappointing. because it is the best car we've had here. By a long shot."

It was the third time in as many Dirt Late Model crown jewel events contested this season that Sheppard has been a serious contender for victory. He finished second to Bobby Pierce of Oakwood, Ill., in last months's Show-Me 100 at Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Mo., and was stalking Pierce for the lead late in June 6's Dream at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio, when a blown right-front tire sent him into the turn-three wall.

So that level of success on the sport's biggest stages is something for to buoy the spirits of Sheppard and his team.

"It just keeps us excited, keeps us hungry for more," Sheppard said. "So, yeah, we're just going to keep plugging away and doing what we can to hopefully click off one of these big ones eventually. We've been right there. We're gonna win one of them eventually here.

"We wanted that one bad, though," he added, mourning his Firecracker fate with a shrug of his shoulders. "It's close to home to Rocket (in Shinnston, W.Va.). A lot of Rocket cars are here. You know, (Richards's partner Steve) Baker's here. It just sucks to lose it."