NASCAR XFINITY SERIES: CHAMPIONSHIP

November 9, 2024

Austin Hill

Pit Lane Interview

Q. Austin, you guys threw everything at it at the end strategy-wise, took some big gambles to keep yourselves in contention. Where did you miss it today?

AUSTIN HILL: Yeah, that's a tough question to answer right now. We just need to go back and look at it and see where it went wrong.

Stage 1, we didn't have a winning race car, but we were better than the other three I felt like. The 7 was really good. He drove through the field. So I'm not sure I was better than him on Stage 1.

Kind of felt free in Stage 1, then we tightened up. And for whatever reason, when we tightened up, it just started over-slipping the fronts, but it wasn't helping the rear grip any. I still was loose on entry.

Maybe I just needed to ask for the car -- our Bennett Chevrolet to just stay on the free side all day. Might have got us behind there on adjustments.

Yeah, then we came in with the 7 and put on stickers. We drove up through there, and I saw the 7 and 00 fighting it out. And I knew we were running out of laps, but I thought if they got into a battle and I could have had a shot, because we were running some decent lap times there, and when the caution came out, I knew we were going to be at a tire deficit, and we had to try something.

We put the right side tires on it, and just got down into 1, and I drove as deep as I could just trying to protect from out back and over-slipped -- the front tires started sliding, and then I saw the 00 trying to get to my right rear, and I didn't want him to get to my outside.

So kind of slid up the track, and then he got in the back of me. And then coming off the corner, I was sideways and then allowed the 7 to get by both of us because I couldn't put the throttle down.

A lot of hard racing out there. I want to say congrats to the 7 team. Justin Allgaier has been doing this for a really long time. I think this was his seventh playoff appearance. To see him finally get it done, I'm very happy for him. I'm happy for his family. He's a great guy to be around, a great competitor. Been fun racing with him all year. Hat's off to JR Motorsports for getting it done.