PODCAST · business
Overdrive Radio
by Overdrive
The Overdrive Radio podcast is produced by Overdrive magazine, the Voice of the American Trucker for 60-plus years. Host Todd Dills -- with a supporting cast among Overdrive editors, contributors and others -- presents owner-operator business leading lights, interviews with extraordinary independent truckers and small fleet owners, and plenty in the way of trucking business and regulatory news and views. Access an archive of all episodes of Overdrive Radio going back more than a decade via this link: http://overdriveonline.com/overdrive-radio
Episodes
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Make a bill, pay the bill: 'You're only as good as your word' in the trucking business
Off the top of this week's Overdrive Radio edition, a little of the voice of owner-operator Robert Forsyth, not bragging one bit about a very long career that stretches back to the 1970s and his pre-CDL chauffeur’s license, log-truck driving and more. With as many times as he's traveled...
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'Our Punjabi brothers': Reflections on 2017 10-4 ELD protests, non-domiciled CDL crackdown
With this episode for Oct. 5, 2026, we're marking the big 10-4 day over the weekend with a look back at the 2017 ELD mandate protests that would inspire the very founding of the TenFour D.C. truck show and advocacy event on the Mall, just concluded for the '26 installment:...
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Take control of diesel quality: New study reveals huge fuel performance variance across U.S.
"You've got to do something for your own fuel, or accept the consequences of not." --Howes lead chemist Jed Talbot How do you know that what you’re getting from your neighborhood No. 2 diesel pump is quality fuel? The $6-and-more-per-gallon price isn’t going to tell you much, that’s for sure, and...
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Lujan v. FMCSA: The non-domiciled CDL ban in court, full oral arguments
Arbritrary. Capricious. Those two words are a principal basis for owner-operator Jorge Rivera Lujan and fellow petitioners’ challenge to FMCSA’s non-domiciled CDL rule. The rule itself is strongly supported by most Overdrive readers, and the petitioners’ challenge saw significant action in the…
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Reliability, service over 6M-plus miles: Owner-operator Dee Zeeman, Trucker of the Month
Off the top of the podcast, the voice of Overdrive’s August Trucker of the Month Dee Zeeman, in a business partnership with wife, Bev, in the back office and hauling for now close to a decade now with authority as White Pine Transport. The name’s a combination of a couple different horse farms he...
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Fraud and cargo theft info sharing, White House task force: Freight crime in spotlight
Off the top of this Overdrive Radio edition, the voice of Atlantic Logistics CEO Rob Hooper talking about trust, responding specifically to a question about whether all the shipper, broker and carrier friction in today’s freight markets is driving wedges between the relationships. Regular…
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Predatory parking-lot-trap truck tows back in headlines: Turn state/local rules to your favor
A tip of the hat off the top of this week’s Overdrive Radio edition to our social media coordinator Jazzmin Campbell, who shared yet another towing mishap occurring in the city of Charlotte, North Carolina. It bears all the hallmarks of a parking-lot trap, the driver reporting a bill for upward…
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From 'Hot Shootin' to true driver support: Owner-op Jeffrey Crise's second run toward a small fleet
This week’s Overdrive Radio features Overdrive Senior Editor Matt Cole's talk with our July Trucker of the Month. Based just outside Baltimore, owner-operator Jeffrey Crise runs open-deck freight, loading equipment quite often out of the port there and, as Cole wrote in his story late last month,...
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AI in the driver's seat? Tony Justice v. Suno, Large Cars & Guitars history, $200K charitable haul
For this week’s edition of Overdrive Radio we're picking up with longtime trucker-songwriter and performer #TonyJustice after getting the opportunity last week to share news of the Large Cars & Guitars truck show’s big $14K haul for the Susan G. Komen foundation. That makes $200K-plus given by…
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FMCSA's broker transparency rule blows past a projected date, more owner-ops move toward shippers
What’s happened to broker transparency? Owner-operators were asking that more than a year ago now, just a few months into the Trump administration, with a late 2024 rulemaking proposal released but no further action then yet taken by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration:...
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Re-air: Should freight brokers' required bond amount vary according to company size?
Since the original April 2024 airing of this edition of Overdrive Radio, our own research has underscored small fleet owner Surinder Gill's contention that the federal minimum bond requirement for brokers should vary in size, depending on the size of the broker's book of business. Nearly half of...
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Hedge against a bad broker: Trucker of the Month Ruben Dotto insists on cash before unload
Independent and step deck-hauling owner-operator Ruben Dotto, headquartered in central Florida, was Overdrive’s Trucker of the Month for June. He's most certainly seen positive pressure rise on brokered rates, particularly for the heavy-equipment and machinery side of his outbound-from-Florida...
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Brokers' carrier vetting in practice, before and after SCOTUS' crash-suit ruling, take two
"The set-up packet didn't even contain a contract. ... [and] would come back and would get thrown into a manila folder, thrown into a file and forgotten, and you were using the truck." --Roar Logistics Senior Manager Scott Filipetti on many brokers' carrier set-up processes in the days of yore…
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Small Fleet Champ: Last month to enter! | Introducing Mike Singleton, chronicling OTR life, biz
Off the top of the podcast this week, a personal invite to all the small fleet owners in the audience to take this final month to get into the competition that is Overdrive's Small Fleet Championship. Time is ticking down fast to the July 31 deadline to compete to be one of four finalists who…
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Get prepped for roadside stops, inspections before CVSA 'Safe Driver' blitz
This week in Overdrive Radio, a sitdown talk with Tennessee Highway Patrol Lieutenant Christopher Brooks I recorded during the first day of Roadcheck in May. You may have heard parts of the conversation in the video two weeks back that centered on one of Roadcheck's primary focus areas in remote...
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21M safe miles on the long road to a golden age: Three trucking elite
An extra-special edition of Overdrive Radio this week, handing the mic over to our own Long Haul Paul and, with the narration this week for the scene out at Large Cars & Guitars last month in Bristol, Tennessee, another of Overdrive's own in regular contributor Bobbi McGee. Her story will be live...
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Spec the truck for the job: Trucker of the Month Ron Schreiner's oilfield turn to a 2007 379
In this week's Overdrive Radio podcast, dig into Overdrive Senior Editor Matt Cole’s talk with Colorado headquartered 5S Express owner-operator Ron Schreiner, leased to Pejsa Family Transportation pulling the company’s tankers out of the oilfield on mostly short dedicated runs. Schreiner’s got…
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After SCOTUS' broker ruling: Will FMCSA safety rating be key to owner-ops' access to freight?
In this week's edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast, dig into issues of safety responsibility in the brokered-freight world after the Supreme Court’s May ruling removing a key defense many brokers have used in state courts to deflect civil lawsuits for “negligent hiring" after a crash. The…
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Truckstop.com's reboot: Inside the leadership purge, staff reduction, renewed customer focus
In this week's podcast, Truckstop.com founder and CEO Scott Moscrip tells the story of his return to an active management role in the company after the prior CEO's removal and company board's insistence he retake the wheel. Since that happened, roughly a year ago now, "we started trimming at the...
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Building momentum: Trucker of the Month Sam Kelly at 3 trucks and counting
With this week’s edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast, hear our talk with Black Sheep Express three-truck owner-operator and "problem-solver" Sam Kelly, headquartered in Mississippi and Overdrive's April Trucker of the Month, putting him in the running as a semi-finalist for our Trucker of the...
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85% of gross, no insurance chargeback for leased owner-ops: Promise kept, with ELD data transparency
Owner-operator and Overdrive 2025 Small Fleet Champ Wes Oberman's mostly-open-deck Oberman Logistics business makes good on growth goals with a transparent promise to owner-operators leasing there: 15% of the gross for costs, no insurance chargebacks. Since his big win last fall in the…
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FMCSA's 'front door problem' and new Motus registration: What's happening May 14, and how to prepare
Bit of a public service announcement for the bulk of this week’s edition of Overdrive Radio. FMCSA Office of Registration director Ken Riddle emphasizes just what owners with motor carrier authority need to do by May 14 this week to prep for the agency’s long-awaited new registration system…
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Roadcheck 2026: Toughest states for HOS violations, ELD tampering and securement in focus
Just how likely is any given owner-operator to be inspected during the next installment of the Roadcheck inspection event? It's slated for May 12-14 next week, and if the 2025 event provides a roadmap, your chance is about 1 in 5. Just post-Roadcheck last year a few thousand of you weighed in…
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20% boost in fuel economy: Perfect timing for Trucker of the Month's new-truck investment
Year 2025 was a rollercoaster downhill for Overdrive March Trucker of the Month Greg Labosky., headquartered in Connecticut. Coming off gains made during a relatively steady 2024 in the 2017 Freightliner purchased used several years prior, and with a semi-finalist nod in the Trucker of the Year...
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What's your cash set-aside for truck/trailer maintenance? Now's the time to boost it
"I think we're really there, where we've finally got tailwinds instead of headwinds." --ATBS Vice President Mike Hosted, speaking in this edition of Overdrive Radio about market fundamentals owner-operators face in 2026, despite the ongoing fuel shock. In this week's podcast, we’re tracking back...
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Smallest fault-code scanner in the world? Diesel Laptops founder honored in Howes Hall of Fame
“Owner-operators want tools, small fleets want tools, to be able to do these things. And it’s not that they’re necessarily trying to save money, usually, but they want to save time.” –Tyler Robertson, founder of Diesel Laptops, on the success of his business providing software/hardware to…
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High time carriers vet the brokers: More from opening MATS panel on fraud fight, AI, more
"Carriers have been vetted to death. ... For 20 years, carriers have been vetted, vetted, vetted. And brokers have not. There's no entry-level audit, no checking in every year like the carrier has to do. The carrier has a responsibility and an ability to start asking questions." --Dale Prax of...
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FMCSA fully engaged with owner-ops at MATS: OOIDA | DACA-recipient CDL holders have hope?
"If you're really concerned about safety numbers, we want zero fatalities, we want all these things to happen ... we have to train people, we have to pay people, and we have to give them a safe place to rest. That's the first three things we should be doing, and until we do that, we're never…
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Heavy/oversize permitting, 'unplugged': Will there ever be a national system?
The answers to the question in the title here came rapid-fire, and with certainty, from reps of six different state agencies with oversize and overweight permits responsibilities, amid much laughter from the assembled at the Specialized Carriers & Rigging Association's transport symposium last...
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Extreme cost, revenue volatility: Small fleet 'gun-shy' about future trucking investment
It’s been some kind of a year and more for Hell Bent Xpress owner Jamie Hagen. The South Dakota and Michigan-headquartered fleet he’s built from one truck over many years is back to 10 all-Mack power units after some reduction in the last, difficult year. Hagen was among Overdrive’s Small Fleet...
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Trucker of the Month documenting the owner-operator journey, and: Diesel! Diesel! Diesel!
Off the top of the podcast this week, the voice of February Trucker of the Month Adam Mackey, headquartered in Mustang, Oklahoma, about his "Aftersolo" Youtube channel where's been documenting his journey through owner-operated trucking since 2022. Named after his dog, Solo, whom he'd sadly lost...
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'Clean this mess up': FMCSA chief's mission with CDLs, ELDs, chameleon carriers, more
In this week's edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast, catch the address delivered by, and Q&A with, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration chief Derek Barrs at the annual transportation symposium of the Specialized Carriers and Rigging Association, held last week in Birmingham, Alabama.…
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OTR trucker-songwriter Long Haul Paul's 'After Party Sessions' to debut with 2026 MATS show
We're getting ready for big Mid-America Trucking Show next month, March 26-28 at the Louisville Convention Center, and ready to host our Trucker of the Year and cover all manner of the various goings on at the event. It's a big undertaking, from set-up to roll-out of the custom-truck show in the...
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'She's the rock': Owner-operator Patrick White's solid partner through tough times
In this week’s edition of Overdrive Radio, drop in with our first Trucker of the Month for the year, West-Virginia-headquarterd Top Notch Transport and its owner-operator Patrick White. White trucks today in a beautiful 2001 Peterbilt 379 hauling a variety of equipment on a step deck, and here...
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'I will not idle, ever': Owner-op channels old-school approach for emissions-fail prevention
In this week's Overdrive Radio, part 2 of our series honoring our Trucker of the Year, John Penn, for the big win for 2025. Part 1, ICYMI: https://overdriveonline.com/15815690 In this edition, Penn details his approach to maintenance with an experiment he's conducted to extend oil drain intervals...
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FMCSA's non-domiciled CDL rule: Meet the owner-operator at the heart of the case against it
"There's a lot of loopholes in a lot of places, systematically, but they're blaming the driver for everything." --owner-operator Jorge Rivera Lujan, about the federal non-domiciled CDL rule changes and what he feels is misplaced curtailment of credentialing, and similarly misplaced public…
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Credit's where it's due: Trucker of the Year builds biz to sustain, pays it forward
A round of applause is due for Overdrive’s 2025 Trucker of the Year, selected from a field of 10 semi-finalist Trucker of the Month honorees, then three finalists. Off the top, one of the freight partners of the winning independent lauded the owner-operator for core strengths of the owner in her...
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What we mean when we say 'freight fraud': Ways to defend trucking against the hydra-headed monster
"These are very entrepreneurial people, and very smart. And at this level, it's a business." --Wex Fleet One's William Fitzgerald Of the top of this Overdrive Radio episode, Fitzgerald, over the Wex company’s anti-crime efforts, made reference to just how organized the rings perpetrating a…
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Plan for better business, take two: Kevin Rutherford/NASTC's ROTC for one-truck owner-ops
Off the top of this week's Overdrive Radio, Kevin Rutherford recalls his first time on a stage speaking to a roomful of owner-operators, back in 1999 at the Mid-America Trucking Show as part of Overdrive's Partners in Business seminar series at the time. The first question he asked the room was…
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Bye-bye 2025: Hope and headwinds for freight, costs, regs in focus in Overdrive Radio
Year 2025 is in the rear view, just back there behind the trailer. With any luck at all, owner-operators are making good time outrunning all that happened during what was some kind of a momentous year in and around trucking. As my colleague Alex Lockie put it in his year-in-review last week just...
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'Remember, honor, teach' re-air: Remembering owner-op's special vets-tribute FLD and Kentucky trailer
We hope everyone had a Merry Christmas last week, and looks ahead with hope for improved conditions for the new year. To get in right frame of mind, what better than to drop back into this special edition around Christmastime 2022, when we drop in on quite an experience for Overdrive Executive...
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Michigan Christmas convoy sets sights on 100 trucks after record 2025 delivering holiday joy
Despite a record turnout in early December, trucker Noah Melton of small fleet Big P Express out of Southwest Michigan isn't 100% satisfied. Melton's one of the organizers of the Red Arrow Convoy, running 45 miles along the Red Arrow Highway near Lake Michigan every year for the past three, and...
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Wreaths Across America: Professional trucker David May's emotional highs, lows on mission to Arlington
"Every day had an episode like that along the way. It was just the high, and the low." --XPO driver David May, reflecting on the roller coaster of emotion hauling in the Maine-to-Arlington Naitonal Cemetery run of Wreaths Across America Off the top of the podcast, we dive right into the…
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Trucker of the Year 'exit interviews,' Part 2: Flatbedders edition
As you'll hear off the top of this week's Overdrive Radio podcast, this “exit interviews” part 2 in our final run to conclude Overdrive's Trucker of the Year competition for 2025 features an all-flatbedders group. You’ll hear a bit of what some call "bygone" driver-to-driver camaraderie amongst…
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Catastrophic engine failure delivers customer calamity: How one owner-operator prepped for the worst
December’s here, and it’s time for the big push through to 2026 and opportunity a new year always brings a business owner to set goals, to lay plans and start acting on them. Yet as you’ll hear in this edition of Overdrive Radio, it’s also true that in so many ways the time for all of that is…
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Trucking tools to prevent fuel fraud, from complex AI to simple cybersecurity self-education
Off the top of the Overdrive Radio podcast this week is the voice of fuel-payments provider Wex's Vice President of Global Anti-Financial Crimes William Fitzgerald, laying out a 1 in 12,000 transaction rate for detection of fraud over the company's entire fuel-payments network. That is, 1 in…
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J.P. Transport: Building max trucking efficiency, with owner-operator John Penn
This week's Overdrive Radio edition puts a wrap up our series featuring 2025 Trucker of the Year contenders with the story of Orleans, Indiana-headquartered John Penn, his one-truck business operating with authority and hauling finished furniture on multistop runs West and/or South from his home...
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How military service set these trucking entrepreneurs straight on course to biz success
Today, a special edition of Overdrive Radio marks the federal Veterans Day holiday, commemorating the military service of so many around the United States. In the podcast, in particular, we'll honor the stories of two vets -- Army and Navy, respectively -- who are equally clear-eyed emphasizing...
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Roadside war stories, camaraderie, truck-ownership advice: Small Fleet Champs deliver
This week's edition of Overdrive Radio drops into our awards ceremony October 23, 2025, with four Small Fleet Champs -- the owners of Clifford Hay Inc., Thomasville Funiture Xpress, Turnage & Sons, and Oberman Logistics all on hand for the event in Nashville, Tennessee. Before the dinnertime...
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'Be the best': Lofty goals, success in execution mark owner-op John Treadway's long career
"Be on-time, put out the extra effort. ... No matter what you're going to be in life, be the best." --Owner-operator John Treadway on his motivation through the years Raised to “be the best” at whatever he did, owner-operator John Treadway is clearly working hard to achieve that lofty goal with…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
The Overdrive Radio podcast is produced by Overdrive magazine, the Voice of the American Trucker for 60-plus years. Host Todd Dills -- with a supporting cast among Overdrive editors, contributors and others -- presents owner-operator business leading lights, interviews with extraordinary independent truckers and small fleet owners, and plenty in the way of trucking business and regulatory news and views. Access an archive of all episodes of Overdrive Radio going back more than a decade via this link: http://overdriveonline.com/overdrive-radio
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Overdrive Radio currently has 500 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Overdrive Radio about?
The Overdrive Radio podcast is produced by Overdrive magazine, the Voice of the American Trucker for 60-plus years. Host Todd Dills -- with a supporting cast among Overdrive editors, contributors and others -- presents owner-operator business leading lights, interviews with extraordinary...
How often does Overdrive Radio release new episodes?
Overdrive Radio publishes regularly with 500 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
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