With a top-five finish in points the past two seasons in the XFINITY Series, Ty Dillon was hopeful that he’d be racing full-time in the Sprint Cup Series by this point. Unfortunately, that isn’t the case as he is in the midst of his third full season of XFINITY competition.
Dillon is hopeful that it will come together for 2016, saying that “there are a lot of good things going on” in his comments. Though the important factor will be whether they can fin sponsorship to make it happen.
“If we can get that kind of sponsorship I’m fine with supporting anything and exposing anything,” he commented. “That is definitely our goal is for RCR is to find a sponsor that we can grow with over the next couple of years similar to what Chase has done. That would be the ultimate goal. There are other opportunities that could come along to provide me to be able to run full-time in the Sprint Cup Series.
“I feel like I’m ready to be in the series full-time as a driver mentally and physically. This year I’m focusing on winning the Xfinity Series championship. Hopefully, make my prospect a little bit better and hopefully that opportunity comes along.”
He also feels he was able to showcase his abilities this year in the races that he ran for Tony Stewart. He posted three top-20 finishes in the five races he started, while driving Stewart’s car to a seventh place finish at Talladega Superspeedway after taking over at the first caution.
“I can’t thank Stewart-Haas and their organization enough for giving me the opportunity to fill in this year with Tony being out,” he commented. “Not only has it helped me with my career and getting better as a race car driver, but it’s helped me show people that I can get the job done in other equipment too. And that I can prove myself in other ways. I’m very thankful for the opportunity they have given me. It’s helped a lot with a lot of things in my career. Hopefully, it just continues to get better.”
Right now, Dillon sits fifth in the XFINITY Series standings with five top-10s in the first nine races, highlighted by a runner-up at Richmond International Raceway. While he notes that they’re not quick as Joe Gibbs Racing right now, he says that they’re closing the gap quickly.
“I think it started in Texas a couple of weeks ago with our car,” he said. “We ran in the top three all week and had opportunities on long runs to compete with those guys. Then it came down, Bristol, we were right there in the thick of things. Austin (Dillon) was running good, I was running good and then Richmond we obviously proved that we are here to stay and we are going to be up front for the rest of the year.
“I’m just proud of the hard work that all my guys at the shop that are building race cars right now are putting in. ECR has done a lot for our program in XFINITY the last couple of weeks to improve our running order. It’s definitely showed.”