For Austin Dillon, Daytona win really was life in the fast lane to make NASCAR playoffs

Just as it was for days leading up to the NASCAR Cup Series race at Daytona International Speedway, dark clouds had seemingly rained on Austin Dillon’s 2022 season.

Only four top-fives and eight top-10s in 26 starts served as bright spots throughout seven months of racing.

At Daytona this past Sunday, rain was the story of the day. After being postponed by a day, the 10 a.m. scheduled start didn’t happen. The skies opened by the afternoon and Cup Series drivers and cars were able to get in the majority of the race’s 160 laps around the 2.5-mile high banked Florida speedway. That was just before a multi-car crash occurred, involving 12 cars as the field entered the first turn just after they began the 139th lap.

While the damaged cars and debris were being removed from the track, the dark skies unleashed another heavy rain storm that delayed the action for 3 hours and 19 minutes more.

Dillon must have been taking needle-threading lessons as he waited out the wet conditions. Somehow, he managed to drop low as the crash was unfolding and masterfully maneuvered his No. 3 RCR Enterprises Chevrolet through the sea of multi-colored carnage to emerge unscathed into the lead.

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NASCAR threw the green flag to complete the final 21 laps. Dillon led seven, dropped to second behind the Ford of Team Penske’s Austin Cindric, and regained the lead on lap 158 after a tap of Cindric’s rear bumper and held the point for the final three circuits. Doing so allowed the Lewisville, North Carolina, native to find his place in NASCAR’s Playoffs for the fifth time in his 12-year Cup Series career.

Dillon was quick to acknowledge he had some powerful help, other than that of crew chief Justin Alexander and his longtime pit crew.

“Feels amazing,” Dillon said. “I prayed before, let God have all the glory and light shine through me. Today getting through that wreck, I mean, it was — I don't know what you call that. We went from 15th to first. I know what it's called. It's called the good Lord was looking after us.”

After such a long day, some questioned if NASCAR would go back to a green-flag condition. DIS has an elaborate lighting system that would have allowed racing well into the night.

Dillon had to remain focused on the job at hand, feeling that NASCAR was going to return to racing.

“You go in that room where they make you sit and put the camera on you forever, “Dillon said. “It's like you're thinking in the back of your head that somebody is going to walk around the corner and say, ‘Hey, congratulations, you've won, but you don't let your mind drift to that. You still have laps to go. I knew after that second storm, I had to get my mind right. If they didn't call it then, we were going back to green.”

Dillon returned to his motorhome during the 3-hour weather delay and spent time with his 2-year-old son Ace. Both would have welcomed a nap but neither took the opportunity. Instead, they watched “Paw Patrol" and The Carolina Cowboys professional bull riders team that Dillon co-owns win at Fort Worth, Texas.

By the end of the day, Dillon was celebrating his own victory for the fourth time in his career to go along with his 2017 Coca-Cola 600 win at Charlotte, his 2018 Daytona 500 victory and his 2020 win at Texas Motor Speedway, all coming with RCR Enterprises owned by grandfather, Richard Childress.

“I've got four wins in the Cup Series and each one of them mean something different to me for different reasons,” Dillon said. “But the Texas one where I had multiple restarts and had to win and cross the checkered flag was probably, from the driver's standpoint, one of the most important wins to me.

“Then now this one, too. To go through all that and to be able to be, I guess, clutch in a moment that mattered is important. To us in all sports, right? To deliver when you have the opportunity to deliver.”

Dillon’s crew chief felt it all came together with divine intervention as well as the hard work of a lot of people on pit road and behind the scenes. As well as a good bit of luck.

“Teamwork,” Alexander stated simply. “We didn't have a ton of damage. We got involved in incidents on pit road early and then got involved in another incident where we had fender damage. The guys did a good job taping it back up and getting the car fixed back up.

“I think we did a backwards pit stop at one point today, but it was good. It was just a good team effort, everyone on the team, the pit crew, all the guys and girls back at the shop that build these cars, just team effort.”

Twice a winner at Daytona makes it very special, especially since he once stood in that same victory lane when he was not too many years older than Ace with brother Ty Dillon and Taylor Nicole Earnhardt when her father, Dale Earnhardt, won the 1998 Daytona 500.

“…There's something about Daytona,” Dillon said. “When you pull through the tunnel, things just happen here. It's an exciting place. It always creates some kind of drama for sure. We love Daytona. We come down early to enjoy this area.

"It was cool because my (last) win, Ace was too little. He was just born in Texas so he could not come. Here is his first time he got to go to victory lane. I don't know what he expected of it and seeing him throw around a little bit of confetti. At first, he was really tired because he hadn't napped, but he got the gist of it after a while and was running around. I was terrified he was going to slip in all the champagne and Coke. He made it through.”

Dillon also made it through with that incredible pass on lap 139. Welcome to the 2022 Cup Series Playoffs.

NASCAR weekend TV schedule

At Darlington Speedway

Saturday

• Cup practice — 12:30 p.m. (USA)

• Cup qualifying — 12:50 p.m. (USA)

• Xfinity Sport Clips Haircuts VFW Help A Hero 200 — 3 p.m. (USA)

Sunday

• Cup Cook Out Southern 500 — 6 p.m. (USA)

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Austin Dillon: Daytona win life in fast lane to make NASCAR playoffs