ASHLAND, KY – Veteran dirt late model driver, Steve Francis of Ashland, KY has announced that he will be driving the Barry Wright House Car on the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series Tour in 2012.

Steve will be bringing his long-time sponsor Valvoline along with him as Steve will be running the LOLMDS tour for the second year in a row. This year Steve finished fourth in the final championship points standings behind Jimmy Owens, Scot Bloomquist and Don O’Neal.

In 2012 it will mark the first time since the 1990’s that the Hall of Fame Chassis builder and co-owner Barry Wright will be hitting the road on a national touring series. He was quite successful with two-time Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series Champion, Scott Bloomquist back then and hopes to help Steve make a championship run next year. Along with Wright the team is co-owned by Troy Baird.

“It was a business decision that I had to make,” says Steve. “Teaming up with Barry and Troy is an ideal situation for me right now, I want to thank Keith and Tader Masters of MasterSbilt Race Cars and Jason at Ohlins Shocks for all of their support in 2011, and they were all great to work with our race program.”

“With the financial burdens now days in all forms of racing, it’s better to team up with somebody as it will relieve me worrying about both being a car owner and driver, now I can concentrate on being a driver and that should help my performance overall in the long-run, we had some really good runs this year, but didn’t have the finishes to show for it, I can’t wait until the 2012 season begins,” said the 44-year-old former World 100 and Dirt Track World Championship winning racer.