Riggs battles balky car, finishes fourth

SPARTA, Ky. -- After rain postponed the Kroger 300 until Sunday, Scott Riggs was forced to spend much of his first Father's Day away from his first-born son.

	Scott Riggs was hoping to win a fuel mileage battle at Kentucky. Credit: VPS Autostock

In fact, Riggs hadn't spent a full night with young Lane Griffin yet. Hence, his time has come to bare the brunt of a sleepless night.

"I look forward to staying up all night with the baby so (wife Jai) can get some sleep," Riggs said, having just finished fourth Sunday afternoon. "If Mom's not happy, no one's happy.

"She hasn't been able to get two hours of sleep straight yet. So I'm going to get home and get caught up on the chores and stay up with the baby."

Riggs' fourth-place run is a bit deceiving. It wasn't easily attained. Riggs started the event Saturday night on the Bud Pole, and though he remained in the top-five most of the night was too free in the corners to really make a run at the leaders.

That was the result of his having hit the wall five laps into Happy Hour practice Friday night.

The car was very loose, so Riggs pitted just before the rains came and made what Riggs called aggressive adjustments. That got them off sequence with the leaders and used up a valuable set of tires.

When the race resumed Sunday, the NesQuik Ford had tightened up well and Riggs went to the front. Only it was too tight. Still yet, Riggs was the race leader with 25 laps remaining when the caution flag flew for debris on the track.

But Riggs, some nine laps short of being able to make it all the way on fuel, was forced to pit. Having no tires left, he got fuel only. He would finish fourth.

"The track was so different today, as day went along we got real tight," Riggs said. "And because of last night's pit stop we were off sync with everyone else. We used an extra set of tires, too, so we couldn't get those on that last stop today.

"I wish we could have found that middle ground, because I know how good our car was. It was really good, we just went from too loose to too tight. We just couldn't hit it in the middle."

"To finish fourth after all that, I'm pretty pleased. I'm just ready to get on home and spend the night with my wife and son at home."