Well, that changes everything.
Or nearly ’bout everything.
And who saw it coming?
Sure, the stats would suggest an Austin Dillon win at Richmond wasn’t out of the question. Of all Cup Series tracks where he’s made at least nine career starts, it’s his third best in terms of average finishes.
Also, a third of his career wins have come at Richmond. Yeah, that’s only two of six total victories, but still, Richmond seems to be the place where Dillon is less, you know, mid-packy. “Tire management” is largely credited, as if tires aren’t used at all those tracks where Dillon is, yep, mid-packy.
Whatever, we’re now up to 14 different winners for 2025, with a real chance to get to 15 this week at Daytona. Alex Bowman will surely volunteer to grab a trophy, if some of those dudes would just get the hell out of his way.
More about that, and some other items, including Dillon’s public service announcement on ladder safety, as we work that old-school H-pattern shifter and get up to speed.
First Gear: Austin Dillon better in cockpit than on ladder
Dillon will belatedly make his sixth appearance in the Cup Series playoffs, beginning in two weeks at Darlington.
Belatedly? He thinks it should’ve come last year when he also won at Richmond, but that win was a little too rough around the edges (and fenders) for NASCAR’s liking, so the trophy stayed but the playoff ticket was ripped up.
In his five previous playoff trips, he’s made it through the opening Round of 16 twice, and both times he didn’t get past the Round of 12.
Dillon began racing full time in the Cup Series in 2014, and though his six wins are more than a lot of guys, right or wrong, he’s often labeled as an underachiever leaning heavily on family leverage — grandpa Richard Childress is the team owner, of course.
Driving RCR’s famed No. 3 Chevy might help with marketing efforts, but it comes with lofty expectations considering the Dale Earnhardt-sized shadow looming over the familiar styling of that number on the car’s side.
There was nothing fluky or controversial about Dillon’s Richmond dominance. He and the No. 3 team earned it, and to think, the driver was playing hurt and, yes, here comes that public service announcement.
Be careful on ladders. Even at the young age of 35, Dillon learned that lesson the hard way. He says he’s been nursing a broken rib for the past few weeks. Fell off a ladder trying to fetch his bow-hunting gear, landed on the bow case and broke the seventh rib on his right side.
He proceeded to finish 10th at Iowa, 15th at Watkins Glen, then first at Richmond. He wears it well, it seems.
I’m not sure what reviews you’ve read about broken ribs, but Dillon confirms the rumors.
“It’s been pretty painful,” he said post-Richmond.
Second Gear: We all feel Alex Bowman’s frustration
We’ve all been there. Right lane full of stragglers, left lane available for overtaking … except for a couple of interlopers who assume doing 48 in a 45 is worthy of left-lane acceptance.
In our case, we’re just in a hurry to get to work, get home from work, or maybe get to Happy Hour before the Miller Lite draft returns to full price.
Bowman was trying to win a race at the highest level of stock-car racing, as well as clinch a playoff spot and, we’re assuming, trigger some financial incentives attached to both. Except, he suggested afterward, “they hate us.”
Bowman’s in-race frustration over the team radio seemed to focus on a group of racers including Shane van Gisbergen, John Hunter Nemechek, Erik Jones and Jesse Love. Mostly SVG, actually — a fellow Chevy driver, no less.
Clogged, stubborn traffic in Bowman’s windshield might not have been fully responsible for preventing him from catching Dillon and making a race of it at the end, but it sure didn’t help.
“A couple of favors,” is what Bowman said he needed to catch Dillon and attempt to pass in the final laps.
“I certainly think we had the better car, but unfortunately, I didn’t get there,” he said.
Bowman started the year in decent fashion before slumping through spring. He’s been very consistent since mid-June but remains winless and now sits atop the playoff bubble as the last guy making the playoffs on points. If there’s another first-time 2025 winner at Daytona, he’s rooting for Alex Bowman.
Or Tyler Reddick, who’s also winless but a mile ahead of Bowman in points.
Third Gear: Chase Elliott crashes, William Byron cleans up
When Chase Elliott hit the wall near the midway point at Richmond, scattered among the debris were 15 playoff points happily swept up by William Byron.
Elliott got the worst of that 11-car dust-up and left Richmond in 38th place out of 38 entries. He entered Richmond 42 points behind Byron in the regular-season point standings, and the odds were already long.
Byron happily goes to Daytona with a wad of house money in his pocket. He finished a modest 12th at Richmond, but Elliott’s early departure was enough to clinch the regular-season championship and those 15 playoff bonus points.
NASCAR has been awarding the regular-season championship since 2017. None of the past three regular-season champs have gone on to win the Cup Series championship, but three of the first five did (Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson).
Fourth Gear: Walker Evans helped NASCAR go truckin’
Among the niche populations of racing enthusiasts, some of the most passionate are those in the world of off-road racing. Those folks lost a giant this past week with the death of Walker Evans at age 86.
Evans piled up 21 off-road championships, nine class wins in the Baja 1000 and landed in three different Halls of Fame, including the Daytona-based Motorsports Hall of Fame of America.
How does this pertain to NASCAR? Some 30 years ago, Walker was among a handful of off-road truck racers who worried about the commercial future of their form of racing. So they began meeting regularly with NASCAR and, long story short, it resulted in the Truck Series, which continues today as a viable NASCAR property.
Former NASCAR executive Dennis Huth was the organization’s point-man for what was originally known as the SuperTruck Series in 1995. He recalls Evans as “one of the nicest guys in motorsports I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting and working with.”
Walker left the hills and deserts to race the early truck circuit with modest results, but as an owner, he won some races and did well with Brendan Gaughan behind the wheel. The early days of NASCAR’s racin’ trucks included owners and drivers from a wide variety of racing cultures, not just off-road but open-wheel, modifieds, etc.
“His motorsports experience was legendary,” Huth says. “His background helped mold the series as one with multi-faceted drivers from numerous racing series that were represented at the inception of truck racing.”
Next time you’re navigating soft sand in your F-150 or Silverado, lower the radio and tip your officially licensed cap to the legend.
— Email Ken Willis at ken.willis@news-jrnl.com
