Austin Dillon Wins at Texas

Originally written for CLNS Media.

Austin Dillon won the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 from Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday afternoon.

Dillon was able to use pit strategy to get to the front late in the race, and he took the lead from teammate Tyler Reddick on a late restart with 22 laps to go.  Dillon continued to lead over two following restarts, and held off Reddick, Joey Logano and Kyle Busch to win his first race of 2020.

Dillon said he was able to change up his restarts to keep the competition behind him in the closing laps.

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“I had to change it up a couple times,” Dillon said.  “Definitely had to earn it; I changed it up.  Waited the second one and went on the last one, so it worked out for me.”

One week after Cole Custer won to lock himself into the Playoffs, and knock Dillon out in the process, Dillon was able to lock himself into the Playoffs. 

Dillon said the victory was the result of his team’s fast cars they’ve been bringing to the track all season.

“This has been coming; we’ve had good cars all year,” Dillon said.  “It means a lot for the family and for our partners.”

Reddick finished second on Sunday for Richard Childress Racing’s first 1-2 finish since 2011.

After getting burned by a mid-race tire strategy call, Reddick said his team worked hard to get back into contention.

“We just couldn’t get our Camaro back in contention after we took right sides,” Reddick said.  “It really shifted the balance of our Camaro and that just put us behind.”

Reddick said he wanted to make sure the battle for the lead was between teammates in the closing laps and didn’t want Logano or Busch to get involved.

“I just wanted it to be between us,” Reddick said.  “I didn’t want to bring other cars into it; make sure we could fight it out.  There was one restart I probably could have…went to his inside.  Unfortunately, we just couldn’t get it done today.”

“Hats off to the 3, all those guys.  Gets one RCR Chevrolet to the Playoffs and now we’re below the cutline.  If we keep running like this, we won’t have to worry about points.”

Unofficial results:

1. Austin Dillon

2. Tyler Reddick

3. Joey Logano

4. Kyle Busch

5. Kevin Harvick

6. Erik Jones

7. Ryan Blaney

8. Kurt Busch

9. Brad Keselowski

10. Aric Almirola

11. Clint Bowyer

12. Chase Elliott

13. Ryan Newman

14. Buba Wallace

15. Michael McDowell

16. Corey LaJoie

17. Matt DiBenedetto

18. Matt Kenseth

19. Chris Buescher

20. Denny Hamlin

21. Christopher Bell

22. John Hunter Nemechek

23. Daniel Suarez

24. JJ Yeley

25. Gray Gaulding

26. Jimmie Johnson

27. Brennan Poole

28. Reed Sorenson

29. Martin Truex Jr.

30. Alex Bowman

31. Josh Bilicki

32. Joey Gase

33. BJ McLeod

34. Quin Houff

35. Ty Dillon

36. Timmy Hill

37. William Byron

38. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

39. Cole Custer

40. Ryan Preece

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