Even though he's with a new team driving a new truck, don't be tricked into
thinking Gary Wiggins is a rookie. In fact, he's one of our sport's
originators.
"I used to go to shows all the time with a street truck," Wiggins
said. "Friends of mine, the Dabneys, had the first monster truck Camaro called
Blue Thunder. They had a shop in Fayetteville, North Carolina."
They talked Wiggins into building his street truck into a monster truck. "Get
paid for doing this," they said. This was 1987.
"Once I did the first show and made money at it, I thought that was a lot
better than coming home with a trophy," Wiggins said.
His truck was the original Mopar Magic. He ran the truck for 7 years on the
national tour. Wiggins even had the memorable experience of bringing one of
the first monster truck shows overseas.
"I had the chance to go to Amsterdam," Wiggins said. "My truck and Outlaw 35,
an old truck out of Florida."
Meanwhile, Wiggins had become close with Carolina Crusher superstar and current
Grave Digger driver Gary Porter.
"My first show was Gary's second show," he said. "We got started together and
we lucked out in that we got tied up with a promoter that worked us side by
side every weekend for a few years. When he had the chance to build another
race truck, he asked me about driving it. After I started driving his, I sold
mine."
This was in the early 90's. Wiggins enjoyed being part of the Carolina Crusher
team and drove for Porter for five years. The demand of the Crusher name meant
a lot of shows, though, and time on the road began taking its toll on Wiggins.
"When I got to a place where I started staying gone for as much as three months
before coming home, that's when I realized it," Wiggins said. "I realized my
daughter was getting old without me. She is in a wheelchair with cerebral
palsy. I'd worry about her. It meant more to me to stay home, so that's what
I did."
Wiggins came back at the turn of the century for a brief stint driving the
Ragin' Steel truck at Monster Jam events. But a phone call from an old
traveling buddy brought Wiggins back into the sport.
"Tommy Powers does all the maintenance on the [Stone Crusher] truck. He was
Grave Digger's main guy when they got started. Me and Tommy were all the time
together. He called me and asked me about driving this truck. Tommy and Steve
[Sims, the owner], were kind of hard to say no to," Wiggins said.
Wiggins debuted the Stone Crusher during the 2005 Monster Jam season with a
clear driving philosophy.
"Steve wants to keep top notch stuff on the truck. He wants the truck to
perform its best, and that's the way it is. If the truck gets torn up, as long
as it doesn't get booed it doesn't matter."
