INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. (May 2) – Brandon Overton’s flag-to-flag victory at Circle City Raceway (Ind.) did more than just snap a 13-race streak of combined victories for Ricky Thornton Jr., Devin Moran and Jonathan Davenport on the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series. It did more than tighten the points race with Garrett Alberson of Las Cruces, N.M. for the coveted fourth-place spot in the Big River Steel Chase for the Championship, too.

The $15,000 victory provided the 35-year-old Evans, Ga., driver for the Longhorn Chassis Factory Team a sense of accomplishment after coming up short over the past month because of flat tires, mechanical gremlins and bad luck. 

“Like our nights have just gotten so screwed up, this is the first night we got to put together in a while, it feels like,” Overton said. “The pressure eases off of us, you know what I mean? Because obviously, you know, I mean, a lot of people are watching us, and a lot of people like it when we're struggling a little bit or whatever. So, yeah, we're just going to keep our heads down and keep working hard and I think we'll be fine.”

Overton’s only had a few challenges at the quarter-mile bullring at the Marion County Fairgrounds. He deftly dodged a spinning Cory Lawler exiting turn four on lap 34 and, on the ensuing restart, repelled Moran’s attempt to get underneath the leader. Overton shut the door for good heading into turn one on lap 37, preventing Moran from grabbing the lead and another big check.“Definitely wish he would’ve went to the top,” Moran said. “If he did, it would’ve been game over, but he’s a great race car driver.

“Congrats to Brandon and them guys. They’ve been having just a lot of bad luck this year, so it’s cool to see them win. I thought I had a chance there,” Moran said. “I almost got all the way underneath him, but just couldn’t bring myself to go in there and door-slam him for the win. I just try to race respectful and he does, too.”

With a victory the first weekend in May, Overton put behind him a frustrating April. He posted a sixth-place finish and two podium runs at Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Mo. to kick off the month, falling short of victory lane. After a third-place run in Schaeffer's Spring Nationals action at Tazewell Speedway (Tenn.), Lucas Oil's Mid-Atlantic swing netted a single top-10 finish at Georgetown (Del.) Speedway, a seventh-place run in a race he led for the first 21 laps.

“I have literally not panicked because I've known that we've been fast for the last month,” Overton said. “Obviously, our results don't show for it. People are watching, probably thinking (negatively) … they don't know what all is going on behind the scenes. Like, we've had bad luck after bad luck after bad luck. But I don't get on Facebook and (complain) about it.”

While Overton may not have panicked, crew chief Anthony Burroughs admitted he was watching the race at Circle City's tight, quarter-mile bullring on pins and needles from his seat in the turn-four bleachers.

“You’re sitting up there just waiting on something bad to happen,” Burroughs said. “The guys have been working really, really hard. Things just haven’t been going our way. We’ve had a lot of speed in the last month, did a lot of testing in April, raced a lot of places where we didn’t want to race but knew we had to race to get better. Just a total, total, big-team effort. To finally get some reward out of it is pretty satisfying.”

 Burroughs, a former University of Alabama football player accustomed to discipline and hard work, said he's never had a time where he has had to rally his crew and driver. All have stayed optimistic despite a rough stretch and the crew chief remains hopeful the worst days of the season are behind them.

“The biggest thing is we work so hard and for those guys to keep a good attitude and everybody's hasn’t been a challenge,” he said. “They come to work every day. and work. But it's not just our team. Everybody works hard, but it is harder to do it and stay motivated when things aren't going good. But it's a testament to our guys, our team, our company, and hopefully we got it out of the way, and we don't have to worry about that because they've already experienced it all. And so hopefully we can just get to race now and just see what we can do. It's a long year.”

The victory brings Overton within five points of Alberson for the coveted fourth spot in series points. He’s not focused on that for now.

“Them points are the last thing that ever crosses my mind, you know what I mean?” Overton said. “If we’re not in the top four that means we are slow, right? If we’re in the top four we deserve to be there. If we’re not, it’s fine, we don’t deserve to be there, it ain’t no big deal. At the end of the day, we want to win. So really, points, it’s fine and dandy, but we want to win the races. If we don’t have enough points by then, we’re not fast enough.”

 With Saturday's Ralph Latham Memorial at Florence Speedway in Union, Ky., rained out, Overton and team are making the eight-hour haul to Wisconsin from Indiana for the World of Outlaws Real American Beer Series-sanctioned Dairyland Showdown at Mississippi Thunder Speedway.

“We’re just waiting on the bad luck to run down,” Overton said. “Like I said, tonight, a lot of things went our way and that’s what you gotta do. You gotta be fast, you gotta be good and lucky all at the same time.”