AVONDALE, Ariz.: With a dominating victory at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway last month, Austin Hill has had extra time to prepare for his first NASCAR Xfinity Series Championship 4 appearance this weekend at Phoenix (Ariz.) Raceway.
The two extra weeks to prepare for Saturday’s 200-lap season finale has allowed his Richard Childress Racing team amble opportunity to make sure they are ready to come out swinging while allowing their driver plenty of preparation time.
Putting their best foot forward, Hill is ready for whatever awaits, hoping to secure his first Xfinity Series championship.
“Really, I don’t have a ton of expectations,” said Hill. “I’m kind of coming into this weekend just kind of free-spirited, just really, just, I don’t want to have these, this, like, high expectations of going and winning practice and sitting on the pole and leading all these laps like I, I don’t have that expectation within myself.”
Hill admitted that he wants to treat the weekend as business as usual, not worry about others’ expectations or put any pressure on himself or his well-equipped Richard Childress Racing team.
“I think that if we just go out there, we do what our No. 21 team is really good at, and that’s maximizing the weekend, minimizing mistakes all day, being very good on pit road, me doing my job on restarts and on the racetrack, and getting spots, when, when, when I can, and just trying to stay out of, you know, everybody else’s mess and melee that might go on,” explained Hill.
“If we can make it to the end and make it the Lap 200 I think we have a really good chance of winning the championship. So, the biggest thing is just that we don’t want to get complacent.
“We don’t want to get too aggressive, but we don’t want to be, you know, skittish either, like, we want to still have that aggression level, but we don’t want to put ourselves in bad spots. So, yeah.
“I mean, I’m just kind of going into this weekend with a clear mindset that win, lose or draw, we’ve made it here. we made it to the final four.”
To give Hill the best advantage possible this weekend, the team led by crew chief Andy Street has built him a brand-new race car. The car has yet to turn a single lap on the race track.
Hill doesn’t expect the race car to be perfect from the moment it unloads and unveils on the track during practice on Friday afternoon. Still, Hill expects to be able to make the necessary adjustments to give them an opportunity to dial it in perfectly for the race.
“Brand, brand new, never hit the racetrack,” said Hill of his race car. “So there’s good things and I guess bad things about that; I think there could be a few bugs that we have to work out, but it’s a good thing that we have a 50-minute practice.
“But anytime that you can bring a brand new race car to the track with all the new bells and whistles on it, it should be better. So, fingers crossed, it is.”
Hill knows that handling will be a factory job, but with the race starting so late in the afternoon on Saturday, he knows the checkered flag will be thrown at night, and keeping up with adjustments will be pivotal to keeping him near the front on Saturday.
“You want to learn as much as you can throughout the 50-minute practice, but it is in the middle of the day. We’re going to be racing at 5:30, and it’s going to go into nighttime very quickly,” explained Hill.
“So, the biggest thing for us is going back and just looking at the history of the races here and stuff, and just trying to figure out, does it seem like when it gets nighttime, do we gain grip? Do we get tighter or looser, that type of thing.
“We’re just going to try, like I said, make the best educated guess that we can. But if we can get our package close in practice, I think it will transfer over to the race.”
Hill said on Thursday at Phoenix Raceway that he will return to Richard Childress Racing in the NASCAR Xfinity Series next season with an option year for 2026.
Not knowing what next year will deliver, Hill is planning to soak up the moments this weekend and hope his journey on Saturday afternoon will lead him to the Xfinity Series championship title.
“You know, this is a surreal moment for me, but as hard as I’ve worked, you know, my entire career, it’s not something that I’m surprised to see. I just have a lot of confidence in myself. I have a lot of confidence in everybody at RCR and ECR. I mean, the whole reason I came over to RCR was to win races.,” offered Hill.
“That was the motto I used right after winning Daytona first race with RCR (Richard Childress Racing, you know, you know, I said on the radio that, you know, I came to RCR for one thing, one thing only, and that was to win races. And we’ve been able to do that. We’ve stacked up 10 wins throughout the last three years.
“We’ve been good. Really, everywhere that we go, we, you know, you look at our stats, we run inside the top 10, a lot inside the top five. So, yeah, I mean, if my younger self, or as my younger self, if they were told that it’s not something that I would be too surprised about your biggest supporter.
“I mean, really, just my entire family. I mean I have a huge support system with with my wife and kids, my mom and dad, they come to all the races. My grandparents drive the motor home for me. My aunt and uncles come to the races as they can so, and then a lot of friends that I have back from home in Georgia.
“I can sit here and talk for a while about, you know, my support system, everybody at RCR, ECR, I feel like the entire organization is fully behind this 21 team. So, it goes really. Deep on, you know, the support system and everyone that believes in me and the beliefs that I have, and everyone else. So, it’s a team effort, and we’re going to try to do all we can this weekend.
“We deserve to be here as a race team, and we’re just trying to make the most of it.”
Follow Chris Knight on X (Twitter) @Knighter01 or email at [email protected].
