By Caleb Whisler, Staff Writer
A sixth-place finish at Richmond Raceway is exactly weekend what Austin Dillon needed in the first round of the Playoffs.
Going into the Federated Auto Parts 400, the No. 3 team was in the conundrum. With the race being an impound event, the team sacrificed a decent qualifying run for a solid running in the race.
“If we had qualified better, we probably wouldn’t have had the car we had tonight. With an impound, we knew that we were going to have to bite the bullet in qualifying,” Dillon said post-race.
“We were super loose in qualifying. That was a long night to sleep on. To wake up, we had confidence. That was heck of a run for us.”
In recent weeks, Dillon has been a consistent frontrunner in the field. Dillon attributes the uptick in performance to the heart his team has and the momentum they have been able to carry.
Last week at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Dillon mentioned that he was hard on his pit crew for costing him spots on pit road. Over the week, the team made a change with the front tire changer.
“I thank my pit crew. I was really hard on them last week because we lost a lot of spots. We made a change in the front this week and it paid off. We gained two spots. They were stellar,” he added.
“When you put it all together, it is so tight out here. When you are looking at it, half a tenth is a lot of spaces. On restarts, getting positions is key. Pit stops matter. Our pit stops were good. I am proud of these guys.”
With the Charlotte Motor Speedway road course next weekend, the main objective is to go in and score as many points. Dillon believes that if the team can get through the road course that the next round will be more comfortable.
“Score as many points as possible. Work hard and just grind it out as we have at all these races. It’s a grind, man. We grind that out, I will feel more comfortable going into the next three.
Our cars have speed. This is definitely going to be the weakest spot for us and I am fine to admit that. Hopefully, my heart will push us to the next one.”
Going into next weekend in Charlotte, Dillon sits just 11 points above the cutoff line in the playoff grid.