It’s tough to come out on top of your family legacy when you are an Earnhardt. Especially when your father was the great “Intimidator.” It’s not every day you win 7 Cup Series titles. But Dale Earnhardt Jr. did justice to that legacy, continuing Senior’s Superspeedway dominance. The ‘Pied Piper’ was more of a title than a nickname, a title that was just as impossible to beat as it was to catch Dale Jr. on Superspeedways. What gave him the title was his four consecutive Talladega wins (from 2001 to 2003), paired up with a couple of Daytona wins. But recently, Junior has lost the title. But, was Dale Jr. actually the best Superspeedway racer?

Folks, no one dominated Superspeedways like Dale Sr in his #3 RCR car. His record of 10 wins at Talladega still holds. And now we have one driver who has beaten both Earnhardts when it comes to drafting tracks. And this is good news for Richard Childress Racing that the title has come back home! It’s Austin Hill…there wasn’t much chatter around him, but he’s silently swept the title away. All this happened after almost winning the Daytona race, followed by his absolute dominance at the recent Atlanta one.

Austin Hill is the new ‘Pied Piper’ of NASCAR

After narrowly missing on the Xfinity Series Championship last year finishing P3, Hill is on a roll this season. First at the Daytona race, he won both stages and was set to win the race. But in the final stage, the #21 car had problems, it was leaking some fluid. And the RCR team could not fix the issue. So the #21 car had to be retired. Then came Atlanta, a chance of redemption for Hill.

And to no one’s surprise, he took the pole, won stage 1, won stage 2, led the most laps (over 140), and took the checkered flag. This was Hill’s 8th Superspeedway win and 3rd consecutive win at Atlanta. And Hill has raced 7 times on the track in the Xfinity series, winning it 5 times. The three consecutive wins record could have easily been 7 had he not finished P2 in the 2022 spring race and P12 in the 2023 fall race. But still, after the recent Atlanta race, he was deserving of the ‘Pied Piper’ title. And who better to crown Hill than Dale Jr.’s old crew chief himself?

Steve Letarte was on the Money Lap podcast as he and co-host, Parker Kligerman made comparisons between the two. Letarte, talking about Junior’s era, said, “Dale Jr. through his years at Hendrick. The real actual speed dominance that Dale Jr. had at Superspeedways was when he drove the 8 car. But yet that reputation just carried through for decades. For the rest of his career. Where he was the pied piper. The Cup Series at Superspeedways. That’s like the art of Superspeedway racing I guess.” 

And now Hill has mastered that art. He could have also broken Dale Earnhardt Jr.‘s Talladega record. But there is something about Hill and Talladega. The #21 driver has won three consecutive poles there and two P2 starts. But has never finished better than P14. Which is strange. Anyway, coming back to Atlanta…Kligerman on the podcast said Hill was so fast that the whole pack wanted to follow him (since catching him was out of the question). “I think they are in the virtuous cycle of confidence. If you watch these races, everyone’s like no one wants to pass him (Hill). I’m like no one wants to not follow him.”

Also, the new Pied Piper broke another Earnhardt record at Superspeedways.

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Austin Hill is the man to beat at Superspeedways

It’s no secret that Dale Earnhardt Sr. struggled at Daytona. He only has three wins on the track and it took him 20 attempts to win his first and only Daytona 500. But folks, we are not talking about the Cup Series. When it came to the Xfinity Series (Busch Grand National), Senior was a beast on Superspeedways. And until the recent Xfinity Series race, only Tony Stewart managed to level with him. The two in their Xfinity careers, won eight races each on Superspeedways. But now Austin Hill has joined the elite group with Atlanta’s checkered flag in his bag. 

Maybe we can call them the three draft racing kings. But how can we miss Dale Jr. from the list? We know Junior hates the word ‘draft racing,’ but he, too, was a master of these tracks. During his Xfinity days, no one came close to his most laps-led record: 691. That’s like 100 more than the Intimidator who sat in P2 with 573. But Austin Hill led 146 of the 163 laps at Atlanta and is the new king. 692 is the number to beat now. And it’s unlikely that Junior would come back to the Xfinity Series. So it would be long before this record is broken. 

And now Hill is also the most dominant driver in Atlanta. He matched Kevin Harvick’s most-wins (5) record on the track in the Xfinity Series. But Hill has a better average finish. His is 2.7 compared to Harvick’s 6.6. And it’s a special track for the youngster. Post the win, he said, “To win in front of my home crowd is always special. I used to come out here and race Bandoleros.”

Also, not just at Superspeedways, overall Hill has had a splendid 2025 season so far. He got a P4 at the recent COTA race. But now the question is, can the 2024 Xfinity season’s winningest driver win a championship this year? What do you think? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.