BRISTOL, Tenn. — Layne Riggs relished his role as spoiler so much that he returned for an encore Thursday night at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Riggs isn’t competing for the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series championship, but that didn’t prevent him from winning the playoff opener Aug. 25 at the Milwaukee Mile.
On Thursday, Riggs passed runner-up Corey Heim for the lead on lap 121 of 200 in the UNOH 200 Presented by Ohio Logistics and held it the rest of the way to score his second career victory and his fourth straight top five.
“Oh, my gosh, we’ve just learned so much with the trucks,” said the driver of the No. 38 Front Row Motorsports Ford. “My team, [crew chief] Dylan (Cappello), he’s bad-ass…
“To be running fifth, 10th and all of a sudden to go back-to-back in the playoffs — man, I wish I was in the playoffs so bad. I think we’d be a real threat to win the championship.”
Heim had to settle for second place, but there was a silver lining for the driver of the No. 11 Tricon Garage Toyota. Heim scored enough points on Thursday to advance to Round of 8, as did fourth-place finisher Christian Eckes and fifth-place Nick Sanchez.
“Every time we got a heat cycle on the tires, it seemed like we got tighter and tighter,” said Heim, who fell one spot short in his defense of last year’s victory at Thunder Valley. “Just didn’t quite have it, but solid points day in the playoffs — that’s what you need, so I will keep moving forward.
“I’m looking forward to my favorite place [Kansas Speedway] next week.”
Heim won a drag race for the runner-up spot over Rajah Caruth, who elevated his standing in the playoffs with a win in the first stage and a solid run the rest of the way.
Caruth vaulted from 10th to fifth in the standings with the third-place run and now stands 35 points above the current cut line with next Friday’s elimination race at Kansas (8:30 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) left to determine which eight drivers advance to the next round.
“We executed the race — just two spots short,” said Caruth, who glanced toward Riggs’ truck doing celebratory burnouts on the frontstretch. “Man, I wish that was us,” Caruth added wistfully.
Reigning series champion Ben Rhodes fought an ill-handling truck and finished 27th, two laps down, and fell to 10th in the standings, 12 points behind Grant Enfinger in eighth.
Daniel Dye tangled with Kaden Honeycutt on the frontstretch on lap 157 and finished 37th, six laps down. Dye heads for Kansas seven points behind Enfinger.
Eighteen-year-old Sprint Car star Corey Day finished 18th in his Truck Series debut. After winning his NASCAR Xfinity Series debut last Saturday at Watkins Glen (N.Y,) Int’l, polesitter Connor Zilisch spun in Turn Four on lap 109 and came home 19th.
Matt Crafton ran sixth, followed by Chase Purdy and playoff driver Ty Majeski, who started from the rear after his team made unapproved adjustments to the No. 98 Ford. Stewart Friesen and playoff driver Tyler Ankrum completed the top 10.