Austin Dillon has been struggling in NASCAR since the 2023 season. And while he is not among NASCAR’s crème de la crème, he had his moments. This season, however, he has plummeted further and is currently sitting at 31st on the point standings.

But despite his struggles, Dillon showed us that he still had it at the All-Star race. He made it to the Top-10, his best performance so far this season. Why the sudden growth? It might be because of his recent crew changes. Although he made it through successfully this time, it doesn’t mean he didn’t encounter any challenges.

Austin Dillon self-criticizes even after a stellar performance in NASCAR All-Star race

Austin Dillon made it to P9 at the All-Star race, which is outstanding given that in the Goodyear 400 he finished P28 and could only get one other Top-10 (P8) at Texas in 2024. His efforts clearly showed in the results, and while he was extremely critical about his performance, he did remarkably well. He appreciated the car saying, “Our No. 3 SENIX Chevy was fast.” However, according to Richard Childress’ grandson, they faced issues with tire management. He said, “We made our way forward into the top 10 with 50 laps to go. We decided to put yellow’s (tires) on, and everyone in front of us took red’s. We were hoping that because of that, they would fade, but it just didn’t happen fast enough.”

But this situation didn’t just arise for Dillon because almost everyone on the track changed their tires from red to yellow after lap 2! And that strategy didn’t work for anyone who reached the top 5 except Christopher Bell. 

Dillion added that even though he was making a pretty good charge at the end, there wasn’t enough time and they had lost too much ground on the hard tires on the takeoff. He even said, “Would have liked to have seen what happened with red’s because they got to beating and banging up front, but unfortunately we don’t get another shot at it.”

Having said that, the RCR driver did have quite a transformative performance, surging from last weekend’s P28 to this weekend’s Top-10. However, what suddenly changed?

Dillion’s striking plunge from P28 to P9! 

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It’s time to acknowledge that something in Dillion has shifted. And, this time, it seems like i’ts his crew! The team noticed how much Dillon had plummeted over the years with his performance. The only change that happened parallel to his performance downfall was the induction of Keith Rodden as his crew chief in 2023.

Due to this, the team made a key change. Justin Alexander, who has prior experience working with Dillon, has now replaced Rodden. In fact, all of Dillon’s four wins at the Cup series came with Alexander being the crew chief. Dillon was absolutely thrilled to have Alexander back on the team. He said, “I think it’s a big morale boost for our team, like I said, and to get Justin back on board with traveling and going to the race track, you know, that was the biggest thing.”

While it did take time for Dillon to show results even after crew change, after his current performance, there is no doubt that the Alexander-Dillon pairing is working well. And even though the #3 racer is critical of his performance,many opine good things might be coming. In a post interview at the North Wilkesboro Speedway, he mentioned, “I think this is a big win for RCR and our short track program, so hopefully we can take what we learned; apply it, and have some better runs moving forward.”

What do you think? Is the driver-crew chief duo going to create magic from now on? Will we see Dillon within P5 or P10 more often? Let us know.