The Long Haul

Jerry Murphy has a felony on his record. He was a raging alcoholic — his words, not mine. Working part-time to drink full-time. He had his own motorcycle shop once and drank it into the ground, and he'll tell you straight up whose fault that was.

Then he got sober. Six years now.

He built a trucking company out of Circleville, Ohio from two trucks scraping by on the load board into an operation his drivers call home. And this past June, he closed on something most small carriers only talk about — he bought a trucking company that's been running for 40 years, from an owner who chose Jerry over every bigger check he could've taken, because he trusted Jerry to take care of his people.

But here's what nobody watching from the outside knew. While that deal was sitting in limbo, Jerry lost his brother. And the man who had rebuilt his whole life found himself in the darkest place he'd been since he put the bottle down. Sleeping past his alarm for the first time in years. Walking away from the jiu-jitsu classes he loved to teach. Carrying something he couldn't name.

He didn't drink. Not once. He didn't even think about it.

Months later, he signed the papers on the biggest move of his life.
This is a conversation about what rock bottom actually looks like, what it takes to climb out more than once, and why the hardest fight isn't building the business — it's believing you deserve what you built.

If you're carrying something right now and telling everybody you're fine, this episode is for you.

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Debon Sims — DJ — got his CDL in 2018 and bought his first semi-truck in 2019 after getting out of a lease-purchase program.

What the intake form doesn't say is what came before that.
DJ has been incarcerated. He knows what it feels like to have the system count you out. He also knows what it feels like to decide that the count doesn't matter.

He landed an Amazon contract early on. Lost it. Spent years grinding load boards and chasing freight that barely covered his costs. And then three years ago he did something most carriers only talk about — he walked away from broker dependency and secured a direct waste-hauling contract that changed not just his revenue, but how he sees the entire business.

This is a conversation about what it actually takes to build something when the world has already decided what you are. About treating trucking like a business when everybody around you is treating it like a job. About finding consistent freight in an industry that makes you earn every relationship you get.

If you've ever been told you were done — by a system, by a market, by a bad decision — this episode is for you.

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Factoring might be the most argued-about topic in small carrier Facebook groups.

Half the comments say it saved their business. The other half say it nearly destroyed it. And everybody's got a story about a contract they didn't read closely enough, a reserve they couldn't get back, or a fee they didn't see coming until it was too late.

The frustration is real. And it's earned.

But here's the part that doesn't get talked about honestly — a lot of carriers who hate factoring don't hate factoring. They hate the decision they made around it. The company they chose. The contract they signed without understanding. The moment they confused having cash in their account with actually being ahead.

Ivan Martinez and George McWilliams have spent years on the other side of that conversation. Between them they've worked with owner-operators and small fleets across every kind of market condition — the freight boom, the recession, the recovery happening right now. George grew up around trucking. This industry isn't abstract to him. Ivan has watched carriers use factoring to grow and watched others use it as a band-aid over a cash flow problem that was bigger than any factoring arrangement could fix.

Today we're not here to sell anything. We're here to have the conversation most people avoid — what factoring actually is, where the industry went wrong, what the legitimate criticisms are, and what every small carrier needs to understand before they sign anything.

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Thousands of people enter trucking every year looking for a better future. Many are chasing freedom. Some are trying to build wealth. Others are leaving careers they have spent decades building in hopes of creating something of their own.

Some make it. Many don't.

In this episode, Adam sits down with Victor "Bigg Vic" Newton, founder of Bigg Vic TV and one of the most recognized voices in trucking entrepreneurship. Before trucking, Vic spent 28 years as a barber, building relationships, serving customers and mastering a trade. Then he made a decision many people only talk about — he bet on himself and started over.

Nearly six years later, he has experienced the highs of great-paying freight, the lows of expensive repairs, the challenges of building a small fleet and the reality of operating in one of the toughest industries in America.

But this conversation is not really about trucks.

It is about ownership. It is about accountability. It is about the decisions that separate the people who survive from the people who quit.

Over the years, Vic has built an audience of more than 100,000 subscribers by challenging some of the most common beliefs in trucking. From chasing load boards and buying trucks too early to blaming brokers, rates and market conditions, he argues that many of the problems carriers face start long before they ever book a load.

This is not the social media version of trucking.

This is the real version.

The version where cash flow matters, mistakes are expensive, discipline beats motivation and success often comes down to how you think when things are not going your way.

If you are an owner-operator, small fleet owner or entrepreneur trying to build something that lasts, this conversation will challenge the way you think about trucking, business and yourself. 

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Military freight is one of the most misunderstood corners of trucking.

Most owner-operators hear about Department of Defense freight and immediately assume:

it’s impossible to access,

only big fleets can get it,

or the system is too complicated to understand.

But the reality is deeper than that.

In this episode of The Long Haul Podcast, Adam sits down with Philip Nenadov, CEO of Military Freight Consultants, to break down how military freight actually works, why the system operates under a completely different standard, and what small carriers misunderstand most about getting involved.

This conversation digs into:

Why military freight demands tighter compliance

Why most carriers struggle to qualify

The difference between transactional freight and trusted freight

How the DoD views risk and carrier accountability

Why discipline matters more than truck count

And what the broader trucking industry can learn from military logistics

This is not a sales episode.

It’s a real discussion about standards, structure, and what separates professional carriers from everyone else.

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Most trucking companies don’t fail because freight disappears.

They fail because cash flow breaks first.

In this episode of The Long Haul Podcast, Adam sits down with Michael Bunton to discuss one of the most overlooked realities in trucking:
cash flow management.

Michael’s background is unique — from professional baseball with the Chicago Cubs organization to human performance coaching before entering transportation finance and working directly with small carriers across the Southeast.

This conversation breaks down:

This episode is not about promoting factoring.

It’s about understanding how trucking businesses survive.

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Everybody wants somebody to blame.

Brokers.

ELDs.

Immigration.

Mega carriers.

The government.

The spot market.

But what if the problems facing trucking today go much deeper than social media talking points?

In this episode of The Long Haul Podcast, Adam sits down with Stephen Ruhe — third-generation trucking operator, Navy veteran, brokerage leader, and trucking history enthusiast — to break down how outdated regulations, industry evolution, and a lack of accountability continue shaping modern trucking today.

This conversation dives into:

This episode isn’t about nostalgia.

It’s about understanding how we got here.

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Many small carriers think they have a driver problem.

They don’t.

They have a messaging problem… a positioning problem… and a clarity problem.

In this episode of The Long Haul Podcast, Adam sits down with Elijah Cramer — who built his career inside driver recruiting before moving into tech and working directly with carriers to improve hiring and retention

This conversation breaks down:

If you’re struggling to hire or keep drivers… this one is going to challenge how you think.

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Everyone wants to own a truck.

Very few understand what comes after.

In this episode of The Long Haul Podcast, Adam sits down with Pamela Polyak — a third-generation transportation owner who took over her family’s asset-based operation at the start of 2020 and has spent years helping small carriers navigate compliance, operations, and growth

This conversation breaks down:

If you think owning a truck means you’re running a business… this episode will challenge that.

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Most small carriers believe they’re compliant.

Until they’re not.

And by the time they find out… it’s already too late.

In this episode of The Long Haul Podcast, Adam sits down with Brandon Wiseman of Trucksafe & Childress Law, a legal expert with nearly 20 years of experience in DOT safety, compliance, and accident exposure.

This isn’t a surface-level compliance conversation.

This is about what actually happens when things go wrong.
We break down:

If you’re running trucks and treating compliance like a checklist, this episode may change how you look at your entire operation.

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