22-year-old Layne Riggs is all the heat in the Craftsman Truck Series right now. Although he did not make the playoffs, he secured back-to-back victories in the Milwaukee Mile and Bristol recently. He also has five top-5 finishes in the last six race weekends. The fear factor that he has induced in those contending for the championship begs us to take a look at his rise to this level of the game.
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2024 is only Riggs’ first full-time NASCAR season. Although he has long possessed the ability to make it in the big leagues, financial troubles pulled him back a lot. He worked tirelessly alongside his father, Scott Riggs, as a teen to maintain an edge in Late Model Stock programs. In 2022, he got the chance to race part-time for Halmar Friesen Racing in the Truck Series.
Although he pulled off a decent stint it did transform into a full-time ride. He resigned to late models again but opportunity soon knocked on his door in the form of the 2014 Cup Series champion Kevin Harvick. Riggs had bested the icon during a CARS Tour race in North Wilkesboro and impressed him with his words outside the race track. And the phone call came the Monday after the race.
Riggs narrated to the press earlier, “Kevin Harvick called me the morning after North Wilkesboro and told me that I ran pretty good. He said he wouldn’t be able to run the late model a lot to get it better for when he was going to build a full-time team. He wanted me to take it to Caraway [Speedway] the following weekend and see what I could do.”
How Riggs made the most of the opportunity that came to him
Just as he had done multiple times before, Riggs found his way to victory lane in the Caraway Speedway and parked the No. 62 there. A technical issue led to him being disqualified but Harvick had seen enough from him. The barred victory was a major turning point in his career.
Harvick signed him up for three more Late Model Stock races. He raced in the Indianapolis Raceway Park for Spire Motorsports and finished third. And he secured a three-race Xfinity Series deal with Kaulig Racing. He spun magic and scored great results in all these events and he was rewarded with gold.
Front Row Motorsports got his signature to pilot the No. 38 truck full-time in 2024. After a slow start to the year, he has picked up pace and now continues terrorizing his competitors with consistent finishes in the top order. One can’t help but thank Harvick for recognizing this gem of a driver and arming him with the right tools.
