“I just wanna go fast,” Chris Ridgway. Chris joins us from the road as he’s hauling multi-million-dollar cars all over the US. If it’s got wheels, Chris has raced it, from motorcycles to Porches. Some great stories in here. Be sure to listen on your favorite podcast app.
6:35 – I wasn’t the most popular guy, I wasn’t the least liked guy, I was just one of the guys.
10:38 – I was still getting lapped in the ADCC beginner class. I wasn’t good. I just wanted it.
19:51 – It was a way of me feeling important and feeling like people like me, and the thing is, as you know about racing, that’s all that matters.
25:31 – I turned pro in ’91, and I got hurt. The big injury came in, I think, ‘95
40:34 – He said, “someone needs to put you in a car.” And I said, “who’s going to put me in a car?” And he said, I will.
48:13 – I had my leg all bandaged up, and I remember smacking it on the dash and someone’s wife duct taped it back up!
52:47 – He had so much more to lose, I felt like I didn’t have much to lose, and so I would take chances like that
1:06:50 – I was like, dude, we can do these doubles, he’s like, well, what happens if we come up short?
1:14:55 – and when you go to SEMA with Jesse Combs on your arm as your co-driver, you get sponsorship
Special thanks to 4low Magazine and Maxxis Tires for support and sponsorship of this podcast.
TRANSCRIPT
[00:01:40.100] – Big Rich Klein
Today’s guest on Conversations with Big Rich has always wanted to go fast, which led him to many opportunities to race, from motocross to the Rolex Series 24 Hours of Daytona to X-games to Baja 1000 and to KOH. My guest is Chris Ridgway. Hello, Chris Ridgway. How are you doing today?
[00:02:03.140] – Chris Ridgway
Good. How about you?
[00:02:04.450] – Big Rich Klein
Doing excellent. So good to have you on the podcast. Really looking forward to finding out more about you. We’ve known each other for a lot of years, but I can’t say that we ever really had a chance to sit down and talk. So this will be good.
[00:02:18.120] – Chris Ridgway
Yeah.
[00:02:19.330] – Big Rich Klein
So let’s jump right in. First of all, I’d like to say thank you for taking the time today as you travel, delivering cars and heading home now. And you’ve been on the road for quite a while, and you pulling over and taking the time for this interview is awesome. So I just want to say thank you for that.
[00:02:39.250] – Chris Ridgway
Yeah, no problem.
[00:02:40.860] – Big Rich Klein
So let’s go to the first question. Where were you born and raised?
[00:02:45.100] – Chris Ridgway
I was born and raised in Van Nuys. Well, I was born in Van Nuys, California, and then raised on the East Coast, like Virginia, and then back to California again by the time I was I think 12 or 13.
[00:03:03.930] – Big Rich Klein
And born on the West Coast, raised on the East Coast, was that parents working or something?
[00:03:14.420] – Chris Ridgway
Yeah. I mean, that was my dad raising me. He took me from my mom, and we went as far away as possible because there were some things that went down, and it ended up being all everything’s good. But it was, I guess for a while, I was too young to really know about it. But for a while, I guess we were on the lam.
[00:03:39.430] – Big Rich Klein
Well, okay. There’s always interesting twists to everybody’s story. So growing up like that, did you have a constant school or were you constantly moving around?
[00:03:54.590] – Chris Ridgway
No, it was… So this was back in the ’70s, and it wasn’t as easy to find somebody. So I was in school and I talked to my mom all the time. I just wasn’t allowed to tell her exactly where I was at and stuff like that. And my dad also made sure that no one ever talked bad about my mom to me. My dad used to say that that was up to me to decide when I was going to have a relationship with her. He wasn’t demonizing her or anything. It was just that he thought that that was the best for me as to be brought up by him.
[00:04:44.860] – Big Rich Klein
I can understand that. And kudos to him for, no matter how it worked out, for trying that and also for not throwing your mom under the bus or demonizing her, as you said, I see that way too often. It never works out well.
[00:05:09.320] – Chris Ridgway
Right. And it wasn’t even for that long. I think it was maybe a year and a half at the most. I don’t really know that. It’s not something that my dad is super proud of. My mom was back in my life by the time I was four, and I would go visit her stuff. It wasn’t like it was that long, but it’s just the way it was.
[00:05:37.530] – Big Rich Klein
What was school like for you?
[00:05:42.260] – Chris Ridgway
I struggled. I’m sure there’s all kinds of excuses now, like ADHD or whatever, but I just struggled at it. I just couldn’t figure it out. I couldn’t pay attention enough. I didn’t comprehend what I was being taught very easily. I’m more about actually doing something or seeing pictures or that thing. I think the only good year I ever had in school is when we moved back to California, the school system in Virginia was a lot farther ahead. When I got to California, it was like repeating a grade almost. So finally, I was caught up. You know what I mean? It didn’t last long. READ MORE
