CONCORD, NC - Austin Dillon raced to his second NASCAR Xfinity Series win of the season on Saturday with a victory in the Hisense 300 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Dillon rallied back after falling out of the lead on the final restart, getting past Denny Hamlin with a three-wide pass with 15 laps to go and leaving the field in his dust – taking the checkered flag by nearly 2.7 seconds over Hamlin.
Kasey Kahne finished third, followed by Regan Smith and Darrell Wallace, Jr.
Dillon’s victory was his fourth in 87 series starts. All four of Dillon’s victories have come from the pole position, but Saturday’s victory was his first at what he considers his home track.
“I know in the Cup Series there’s only two of us from North Carolina – myself and Junior(Dale Earnhardt) – and my brother coming up in the Xfinity Series so it’s huge for us North Carolina boys to take home a trophy in our home state,” said Dillon.
Dillon led from the pole and was clearly the car to beat from the outset, leading 104 of the opening 111 laps before yielding the lead during a round of pit stop on lap 111 when Kevin Harvick elected to stay out.
With clean air ahead of him, Harvick held the lead on the restart with Dillon running right behind him on the inside lane, but Dillon quickly chased him down to regain the top spot on lap 123.
Dillon’s only real mistake on the track came during a lap 167 restart, where he chose to run the inside of the track and this time it bit him as Hamlin and Smith split Dillon down the middle on the backstretch, sending Hamlin to the lead and Smith to second while Kasey Kahne slipped by on the outside to take third.
Dillon quickly rallied, powering past Kahne and Smith to move back into second and back into the hunt for the lead.
On lap 186, Dillon caught up to Hamlin and made his move on the frontstetch – using the lapped car of Sellers as a pick to move to the inside of Hamlin and around for the lead.
Hamlin, clearly not impressed by Dillon’s bravado, tried putting the bumper to the back of Dillon’s Chevrolet on the backstetch but Dillon hung onto it and started to pull away.
For the rest of the way, the clean air and Dillon’s dominant car proved unbeatable as he easily outdistanced Hamlin to the finish.
“I had been dealing with lapped traffic all day, so I think I just guessed right on that one,” said Dillon of the final pass for the lead. “It was the perfect storm because Denny hadn’t been up front dealing with the lapped cars and when (Hamlin) went in on the top I said “Here we go, here’s my shot” and the 97 just stayed low off turn four enough where I could stay in the middle and I don’t know if we door-slammed or not but it was pretty darn close.
“Coming off two, my spotter did a great job to clear me. I took a long time for me to make myself clear, but it worked out.”
Hamlin, who himself has fought back after pitting for a loose wheel on lap 88, picked up his second-straight top-two Xfinity Series finish. Saturday was his last schedule start in the no. 54 Toyota, filling in for the injured Kyle Busch.
“I’m happy with a second-place finish considering what I thought we had for a car all day,” said Hamlin. “I thought we were probably a fifth to sixth-place car at best, but we just – we were able to get a good restart and try to hold those guys off, but he just had a little bit too much speed for me.
“I was proud of the pit stop that got us out with a shot there at the end and then the restart was a good restart and we were in front of them, but we needed to hold him to the bottom line and the 97 (Peyton Sellers) moved. He gave us the bottom instead of the top and it just allowed the 33 (Dillon) to get around us. It’s just part of it. It probably would have been a matter of time before that 33 was going to get around us anyway, but enjoyed at least racing for the lead for a little while.”
Smith’s third-place finish qualified him for the Xfinity Series Dash4Cash program along with Wallace, sixth-place Daniel Suarez and seventh-place Ty Dillon, who will all compete for $100,000 at next weekend’s race at Dover.
Wallace’s fourth-place showing was his first career top five finish in the Xfinity Series, topping his previous best of sixth.
“It was a good run. It was a top-five run for us, our first one of the year,” said Wallace. “That’s the first time I finished a top series race here, so that’s something to be proud of.
“We just need a little bit more. The clean air here was a big deal, so that’s the first time I really felt it. Clean air is your best friend in these races, so we’ll build off of this. It’s a good top-five, a good momentum boost for our team. We needed this. We’ll build off of it and take this top five into Dover and really have some fun next week.”
Chase Elliott finished eighth, followed by Elliott Sadler and Ryan Blaney.
Xfinity Series points leader Chris Buescher finished 11th and held onto the points lead over by four points over Ty Dillon. Elliott held onto third in the standings, followed by Wallace and Smith.
NASCAR Xfinity Series
Charlotte Motor Speedway – Concord, NC
Hisense 300 – May 23, 2015
1. (1) Austin Dillon(i), Chevrolet, 200, $70854.
2. (4) Denny Hamlin(i), Toyota, 200, $45242.
3. (8) Kasey Kahne(i), Chevrolet, 200, $35150.
4. (15) Regan Smith, Chevrolet, 200, $34424.
5. (2) Darrell Wallace, Jr. #, Ford, 200, $35548.
6. (19) Daniel Suarez #, Toyota, 200, $29090.
7. (9) Ty Dillon, Chevrolet, 200, $27577.
8. (16) Chase Elliott, Chevrolet, 200, $27640.
9. (11) Elliott Sadler, Ford, 200, $25831.
10. (12) Ryan Blaney, Ford, 200, $25997.
11. (14) Chris Buescher, Ford, 200, $24514.
12. (10) Ryan Reed, Ford, 200, $23983.
13. (24) Jeremy Clements, Chevrolet, 200, $23375.
14. (13) Kevin Harvick(i), Chevrolet, 200, $16895.
15. (7) Erik Jones(i), Toyota, 200, $23170.
16. (18) Dakoda Armstrong, Ford, 200, $22287.
17. (21) Landon Cassill, Chevrolet, 200, $22060.
18. (17) Brendan Gaughan, Chevrolet, 199, $21832.
19. (6) Aric Almirola(i), Ford, 199, $15806.
20. (3) Brian Scott, Chevrolet, 197, $22255.
21. (25) J.J. Yeley, Toyota, 196, $21554.
22. (32) David Starr, Toyota, 196, $21497.
23. (30) Blake Koch, Toyota, 196, $21448.
24. (22) Ryan Sieg, Chevrolet, 195, $21381.
25. (28) Chad Boat(i), Chevrolet, 194, $15496.
26. (35) Jimmy Weller, Chevrolet, 193, $21311.
27. (34) Kyle Fowler(i), Toyota, 192, $15275.
28. (38) Peyton Sellers #, Chevrolet, 192, $21240.
29. (23) John Wes Townley(i), Chevrolet, 191, $21194.
30. (36) Eric McClure, Toyota, 189, $21449.
31. (20) Ross Chastain #, Chevrolet, Engine, 187, $21113.
32. (39) Joey Gase, Chevrolet, 186, $21067.
33. (5) Kyle Larson(i), Chevrolet, 183, $15097.
34. (26) Cale Conley #, Toyota, 146, $20991.
35. (27) Harrison Rhodes #, Chevrolet, Transmission, 141, $20957.
36. (37) Carl Long, Dodge, Engine, 129, $19499.
37. (33) B.J. McLeod(i), Chevrolet, Fuel Pump, 58, $18499.
38. (31) Jamie Dick, Chevrolet, Accident, 45, $17499.
39. (29) Timmy Hill(i), Toyota, Electrical, 40, $10499.
40. (40) Jeff Green, Toyota, Vibration, 2, $9499.
Average Speed of Race Winner: 139.824 mph.
Time of Race: 02 Hrs, 08 Mins, 44 Secs. Margin of Victory: 2.692 Seconds.
Caution Flags: 3 for 22 laps.
Lead Changes: 9 among 7 drivers.
Lap Leaders: A. Dillon(i) 1-98; D. Wallace Jr. # 99; K. Kahne(i) 100; D. Suarez # 101; L. Cassill 102-105; A. Dillon(i) 106-111; K. Harvick(i) 112-122; A. Dillon(i) 123-166; D. Hamlin(i) 167-185; A. Dillon(i) 186-200.
Leaders Summary (Driver, Times Lead, Laps Led): A. Dillon(i) 4 times for 163 laps; D. Hamlin(i) 1 time for 19 laps; K. Harvick(i) 1 time for 11 laps; L. Cassill 1 time for 4 laps; D. Suarez # 1 time for 1 lap; K. Kahne(i) 1 time for 1 lap; D. Wallace Jr. # 1 time for 1 lap.
Top 10 in Points: C. Buescher – 401; T. Dillon – 397; C. Elliott – 373; D. Wallace Jr. # – 371; R. Smith – 360; E. Sadler – 352; B. Scott – 350; R. Reed – 320; D. Suarez # – 320; B. Gaughan – 309.
