It must have felt like the weight of a world upon Layne Riggs on Xfinity Series weekend at Martinsville Speedway in October and it certainly looked like it at times.
Riggs said on practice and qualifying day that he felt a degree of pressure to perform. It was just his third start of the season and it came in the 32nd race of the season and there was a lot of ground for him to make up against the regulars.
And it was a weekend where there was much to digest.
This was the weekend that Front Row Motorsports general manager Jerry Freeze first approached Riggs about their open Truck Series ride for 2024 due to the impending departure of Zane Smith to the Cup Series.
That conversation effectively ended with what amounted to a ‘good luck, we’ll be watching you,’ and Riggs responded to all kinds of adversity by leading laps and finishing with a definition hard fought 11th in the Kaulig Racing No. 11.
“I thought it was a great race for me,” Riggs told Sportsnaut on Saturday. “We got spun twice. we didn’t have the best car but I showed I could persevere. I never doubted myself or the team their pit stops and track position bailed us out, and I think I really proved a lot that day.”
Freeze must have felt that way too, because he made the phone call on Monday and offered one of the most competitive rides in the recent history of the division.
Riggs may be the son of Cup Series veteran Scott Riggs but that doesn’t imply anything was given to the 2022 NASCAR Weekly Series champion without merit. Truthfully, the Riggs made the most of a competitively modest program fueled as much by their reputation and a desire to see young Layne make it than Scott having Cup Series money.
He doesn’t.
“I had to make my own legacy,” Riggs said. “I had to do it the hard way. Dad was one of the last in his era to make it that way and he says lightning had to strike for it to happen. Now he says lightning struck twice with this opportunity.
“I’m very grateful to everyone that has helped me get here but there is a lot of work to do. Late Model to Trucks is the biggest jump and I’m ready to get to work.”
Riggs has made six Truck Series starts over the past two years so he is starting to grasp the basics of the platform but concedes there is a long way to go.
“A lot of new places to learn,” Riggs said. “COTA, the superspeedways, tracks that are out of my element. Dylan (Cappello) is a first-year crew chief so I’m as green as I can be but we have Josh Williams spotting and Dylan has a lot of experience. We have everything we need to hit the ground running.”
To his point, this may be the first year that Cappello has led a team but he has years of championship experience as lead engineer under Chris Lawson. Better known as ‘Tic Tac,’ Lawson is leaving the team to pursue interests outside of the sport but will remain with Cappello and Riggs as a consultant to start the season to ensure a smooth transition.
Additionally, Cappello is a fellow pavement Late Model racer so they have forged a quick friendship over the offseason. Riggs said it feels comforting similar to what his dad says it was like when he was paired with a former Late Model Stock driver turned Cup crew chief in Rodney Childers.
“We’ve gone to lunch a couple of times and he speaks our lingo,” Riggs said of the Late Model Stock vernacular. He went to school for an engineering degree and I’m finishing mine right now so there are just a lot of similarities.
“It’s like dad and Rodney and they got along well from Day One.”
Speaking of his education, Riggs is a senior at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte where he expects to graduate by this time next year. He was set to complete his education by this summer but reduced his work load so he can focus on his full-time job.
It’s the job he has pursued his entire life.
“I get to race as a full-time job and it’s something I take seriously,” he said. “I have some big-time shoes to fill here with Zane leaving. He had more NASCAR experience than I did before getting in this truck but I have full-time confidence with this team behind me that this can be the start of something really special. I’ll be ready.”
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.