Ty Dillon’s first full-time season with Spire Motorsports hasn’t been impressive at all. The second-youngest ARCA Racing Series champion hasn’t been able to show his talents yet. Even after having raced in five full-time seasons, the expectations were high, but Dillon is yet to deliver on that. However, it is noteworthy that, to win races and championships, there are a lot of things that need to go right.
Having a good car, crew chief, and team is as essential as being a good driver. Having raced for several teams on the grid, Dillon hasn’t been able to find a perfect match yet. However, Spire Motorsports has recently made a big step towards bringing some performance back into their team.
Ex-Hendrick Motorsports crew chief all set to manage Ty Dillon
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Spire Motorsports has just reeled in former HMS crew chief Kevin “Bono” Manion into their ranks for the remainder of the season. Manion will be the interim crew chief for Ty Dillon and the No. 77 team from the coming weekend at Richmond.
Kevin Manion also known as “Bono” is best known for his two consecutive Xfinity championship wins with Martin Truex Jr in 2004 and 2005. Manion is one of the few crew chiefs in the history of NASCAR to have won races in all three NASCAR national series – Cup, Xfinity, and Truck.
He’ll be coming to the aid of Dillon who has struggled a lot this season. Dillon has failed to score a single top-10 finish in this entire season. In the 21 races, his best finish has been 14th at the Talladega Superspeedway in April. Nevertheless, Spire Motorsports co-owner Jeff Dickerson has faith that the partnership between Manion and Dillon could help them in getting better results.
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The owners at Spire Motorsports have faith in the Manion-Dillon partnership
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Jeff Dickerson has been making attempts to better their results this season. In a recent interview, he talked about the lack of positive results that the team has shown this season. He admitted that both Ty and No. 77 Team have put a significant amount of effort but haven’t been able to get the desired result.
However, Dickerson feels that Kevin Manion’s arrival might help in improving results. He stressed, “We are what our results say we are. We need a spark to give this team every opportunity to progress and ultimately succeed. We’re incredibly fortunate to have someone as accomplished as Bono already in-house.”
Nevertheless, Dickerson also remained realistic and didn’t expect a huge transition in the performance of the car. As he said, “We admit, it might not change the trajectory of the season for the No. 77 team. However, doing nothing, although tidier and more comfortable, especially with the relationships involved, clearly is not an option for us anymore and we are keen to see improvement.”
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There are five races remaining this season before the playoffs and all Dillon requires one win to get into the playoffs. Looking at their current performance, it might be wishful thinking for him to qualify. However, getting some top-10 and top-5 finishes could be a great achievement for both Ty Dillon and Kevin Manion at this point.
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