By Luis Torres, Staff Writer/Photographer
Austin Dillon’s 12th full-time season in the NASCAR Cup Series is symbolized with one word in mind: urgency.
The type of urgency where the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing squad is looking to become a better team after having a year full of lows and one positive last year.
Even the one positive can be perceived as tainted as the infamous victory at Richmond Raceway couldn’t be enjoyed following NASCAR disallowing his win being counted towards a playoff berth for wrecking both Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin on the last lap.
In the first eight races of this season, it seems not much have changed results wise, but Dillon’s team are now hitting its stride ahead of Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway (6 p.m. ET on Amazon Prime).
Over the past four races, Dillon has racked up three top-10s in that span with a seventh at Texas Motor Speedway being his best result.
Among the key attributes of Dillon’s sudden uptick on results is the fast work being done at the shop, something they’ve wanted to improve upon this year. Therefore, the word urgency came into play as to why it was important to accomplish.
“If there is something that we can do better, it is getting done faster,” said Dillon during Friday’s media availability.
“It’s not like – ‘Oh, we’ll figure it out the next week.’ It’s – ‘Hey, how can we accomplish this now? Or this is very important to us, let’s get this done right this time around.’
“It’s not like – ‘Well, let’s go look at it and it’ll work, you know, two weeks from now, or when we can get to it, we’ll get to it.
“Now it’s more of urgency to get things done that we think have juice in them. If it’s worth the squeeze, we’re going to squeeze all out and try and get it as fast as possible. That’s from the car side, to the driver’s side, to the crew chief’s side… all of it.”
The urgency side isn’t just the his team, but also the other side of the organization on Kyle Busch’s No. 8 entry. And while both cars are winless after 12 races, Dillon commented how they’re still learning. This includes his communications with crew chief Richard Boswell that’s gone decent.
Far from where they want to be as a team, but they’re quickly trying to figure out how to move up on the grid.
“It’s just a balance. Like I know the race cars and I get frustrated a little bit because I know the race car is capable now with the speed that we’re bringing. At least I feel that way,” said Dillon. “But the car will be handling just a couple numbers off of what it needs to be. I can see the group of cars that I need to be in, and I can’t get there because I’m either too loose. Mostly been too loose, truthfully. We’ve missed on the loose side probably for the last two or three weeks.”
A loose Chevrolet machine plagued Dillon’s performance at Kansas where he finished 22nd after finishing in the top-10 the previous three races. It left Dillon frustrated because suddenly the team went back to a low point, but there will be a different approach ahead of the 600-mile race.
The biggest trait is continuing to work his way up the running order with Dillon acknowledging they’ve done so than in previous years.
“We’ve kind of focused a little different direction on coming here, closer to where we were at the beginning of the year at Las Vegas,” said Dillon. “I thought we hit our balance really well there, but unfortunately, got in a wreck.
“We’re passing more cars than we have in the last three years this year. If you look at passing metrics, I’ve had the capability to pass a lot. Even (in the All-Star Race) at North Wilkesboro, I drove up to seventh in that race. The cautions and stuff came out and you get put in the wrong lines, but you know, as far as being able to pass, I’ve had a good season of that.”
Dillon knows what a strong result in the 600 means for him and the entire organization. His first Cup Series win took place at Charlotte in 2017 when his car was running on fumes when he scored the victory in NASCAR’s longest race of the year.
As much as he remembers fondly of his first Cup win, it’s the one that got away from him in 2022 that had Dillon reflecting what might’ve been.
In that race, Dillon had fresh tires and was on his way of taking the lead away from Kyle Larson, but a hard charging Ross Chastain tried making a three-wide pass, almost four-wide with Hamlin beneath everyone heading into Turn 4.
However, Chastain and Larson made contact which caused a multi-car crash, collecting Dillon and ended a shot at a second Coke 600 win.
Dillon explained how he still kicks himself over the defeat and hopes to rectify that moment with another win that’ll put him in the playoffs.
“When you think about races over time, that one is the one because I think if I would have given up like a car length and wrapped turn four, I would have had four tires to make it work through one and two for one more lap,” Dillon explained.
“So that’s one that it was so close, but hopefully we get that opportunity again and we capitalize on it. The momentum from this whole year, I feel good about coming here. I think we can have a good weekend.”
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