LAKEVILLE, Conn. — Layne Riggs has a thoughts to make his new nickname stick. Identical goes for his current momentum swing.
After within the San Diego street-course inaugural — the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Collection’ most up-to-date race on June 19 — Riggs has two wins within the three road-course occasions which were held this 12 months. Submit-race at Naval Base Coronado, the 24-year-old Entrance Row Motorsports driver broke out his new alias of “Layne van Riggsbergen,” a nod to road-course ace Shane van Gisbergen, given his newfound road-racing success.
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Riggs may have one other alternative to dwell as much as his billing within the LiUNA 150 at scenic Lime Rock Park, which hosts the Truck Collection’ closing road-course race of the season in a Saturday matinee (1 p.m. ET, FS1, FOX One, NRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
“LVR, hopefully he makes his return,” Riggs stated with a smile Friday morning, on the collection’ load-in day. “LVR has been doing quite a lot of training within the Ford Racing simulator. Joey Hand, our road-course teacher at Ford Racing, all the time does a extremely good job. He’s acquired quite a lot of expertise in any respect these locations and simply actually good perception on how one can go quick on these highway programs. The Fords being quick in any respect of them has actually been a very good story of why. So yeah, I’m enthusiastic about it, and hopefully, LVR is simply as robust as SVG.”
Saturday’s 100-lap showdown marks the collection’ second occasion on the 1.478-mile highway circuit tucked into the majestic hills and sprawling pastures of Connecticut’s northwest nook. Riggs led one lap in final 12 months’s inaugural race at Lime Rock, contending earlier than his No. 34 Ford ran broad on the primary flip of the ultimate restart. Final 12 months’s Truck Collection champion, Corey Heim, led the opposite 99 laps in 2025, however shouldn’t be entered this 12 months in his partial Truck schedule.
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Riggs’ current run this season has mirrored Heim’s cost by way of the schedule throughout his championship marketing campaign a 12 months in the past. He has 5 consecutive top-five finishes, a tear that features three victories (Charlotte, Nashville, San Diego), and that uptick has carried him to the highest of the Truck Collection standings, going from 38 factors again firstly of that stretch to a 65-point benefit over his nearest challenger — Tricon Storage’s Kaden Honeycutt — heading into Lime Rock.
Conserving that regular surge going is Riggs’ precedence, particularly with 5 occasions remaining earlier than the seven-race Chase begins.
Layne Riggs wins Naval Base Coronado within the Craftsman Truck Collection.
“I really feel like that is the place we’re speculated to be, and this crew, that is their stage they need to be acting at. So actually glad that we will execute lately, have quite a lot of good stable runs and win two highway programs this season,” Riggs stated, calling it a “feat in itself” to prevail within the collection’ first occasion in St. Petersburg’s streets. “… Having the factors lead, the largest lead we’ve had of the 12 months, I’m enthusiastic about it. Really feel like we simply have to give attention to managing it. We have to focus extra on not making errors than we do about having the one further step forward of everyone else.
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“Silver and bronze are simply high-quality when you may have this a lot of a lead. Proper now, the largest factor is simply not having the errors, going off monitor, having pit-road penalties, rushing on pit highway, getting in a wreck, having a mechanical failure — all these issues that would come into play to shortly take you out of these conditions, simply to not have these and simply preserve having top-five runs. Our solely purpose in the intervening time is to be seeded No. 1 headed into the Chase, and just about moreover that, that’s all we will do in the intervening time.”
Becoming a member of the regulars within the 33-truck area are a handful of distinguished company from different motorsports worlds. Louis Foster, final 12 months’s IndyCar rookie of the 12 months, is about for his NASCAR debut in Freedom Racing Enterprises’ No. 76 Chevrolet, and IMSA competitor Graham Doyle may even make his first profession Truck Collection begin in Tricon’s No. 5 Toyota. Sports activities-car veteran Colin Braun will probably be again in Kaulig Racing’s free-agent Ram, and Parker Kligerman will make simply his fourth Truck begin of the season, however his first with Spire Motorsports’ No. 77 Chevrolet crew.
Lime Rock has particular which means for Kligerman, a Connecticut native from Westpoint, practically 55 miles south of the monitor. A variety of firsts from his love affair with racing have come on the pastoral course — the primary place he noticed, drove or received in a race automobile. It’s a part of why he joined the Lime Rock possession group in 2021.
Kligerman was a part of the welcoming delegation of drivers and groups throughout Thursday’s hauler parade, which proceeded by the stately White Hart Inn within the quaint coronary heart of close by Salisbury. The group has been examined in current days by extreme storms final weekend that snapped timber and unfold energy outages by way of the realm, however underneath sunny skies amid a diligent rebuilding effort, the turnout was robust on the fork of Routes 41 and 44 simply to the monitor’s north.
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The heartwarming moments continued for Kligerman after his at-track arrival for the storage’s Friday opening. He’s racing the No. 77 — a popular quantity that he’s loved success with — for Spire, which inhabits the previous Kyle Busch Motorsports store. Kligerman raced one season in what’s now referred to as the O’Reilly Auto Elements Collection for Busch, and his No. 77 journey wears a KBM decal on its left-front bumper.
“This can be a very cool weekend for me, and I had the thought: I used to be strolling down the hill after parking up on the high, and I used to be like, ‘man, if 9-year-old me knew he was at Lime Rock, and he’s strolling down this hill like he did as a child, however he’s there to race for a high crew like Spire within the NASCAR Truck Collection, he would simply been ecstatic.’ ” Kligerman stated. “That was a cool second, however yeah, this implies quite a bit, and it’s type of a dream I didn’t even know to dream, which is hey, you’re gonna come again right here on this capability and get to race at a spot which means a lot.”
Drivers returning to the comfy highway course discovered some variations from final 12 months’s occasion in Friday’s monitor stroll — a stretch of repaved asphalt on the exit of the Flip 2 portion of the opening Massive Bend sweeper and a smaller patch in Flip 5. The monitor is deceptively easy, with simply seven turns and a format that’s brief by most road-course requirements. Kligerman stated IMSA veterans usually thought-about Lime Rock as that circuit’s bullring equal to Bristol Motor Speedway, however Truck Collection drivers final 12 months encountered a brand new venue that’s heavy on each right-hand turns and tempo.
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“I do suppose it’s a difficult monitor,” Kligerman stated. “It’s excessive velocity and due to that, I believe final 12 months quite a lot of these groups and drivers discovered how one can deal with this place otherwise, as a result of you recognize they type of acquired right here considering a method after which realized, wait a second, that is a completely completely different monitor than we in all probability perceived from the skin.”
Riggs and Honeycutt have monopolized the collection’ high two spots within the standings, and likewise, their groups have poured it on for the highway programs. Entrance Row’s Fords and Tricon’s Toyotas have received the final 9 road-course occasions within the Truck Collection, courting again to the beginning of the 2023 marketing campaign.
The final winner outdoors of FRM/Tricon on highway programs? It’s Kligerman, who propelled the family-owned Henderson Motorsports No. 75 Chevrolet to victory at Mid-Ohio Sports activities Automobile Course in 2022.
“I’d love the chance to convey it again to the Chevy facet just a little bit,” Kligerman stated of his weekend probabilities.
