INTERVIEW: Crunch time for Austin Dillon

This Sunday, Austin Dillon will line up at Dover for his 151st career Cup start. And it's an important one. Sitting right on the cut-off line to make it through to the next round of the playoffs, this weekend a do-or-die affair for the 27 year-old should he want to be among the last four drivers standing come November 19 at Miami-Homestead.

Q: The first two rounds of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup playoffs have been a little rough on you and the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing outfit, with a 16th at Chicagoland and a dented-up 19th last Sunday afternoon at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Nonetheless, you're still in it, huh?

AUSTIN DILLON: I am, and I'm happy to be in the situation we're in. We got our chance this weekend at Dover to make it to the next round. I feel like I made a huge mistake in Chicago; we'd be in a better situation if I wouldn't have sped on pit row. We had a heck of a race car there, and probably would have scored points in both stages and finished anywhere from fourth to sixth in that race. So I screwed up a little bit there. I'm confident going into this weekend at Dover. We have to beat two guys to make it to that next round, and then it resets and kind of restart with three tracks I like with Charlotte, Talladega and Kansas. First off I'm just going to focus on Dover and having a good show, and we'll be in the next round, in my opinion.

Q: What makes Dover such a unique race track?

AD: What makes it unique is just the speed you carry and how the tires fall off and the rubber lays down. You get in a corner there and you're on a qualifying lap... you're trying to catch your breath by the end of it. That's going to be important this weekend – qualifying. I'm looking forward to Friday and hoping we can set it off right from the beginning, and have a fast car there on Friday.

Q: What's your take on how your 2017 season as a whole is playing out? You raced to your first win at Charlotte and had a host of top five and top 10 finishes, but the results fell off a bit during the summer months...

AD: Yeah, we found some speed the second half of the season. Well, I shouldn't say second half, but we found some speed in the last little bit of the season. That's always positive, and I'm looking forward to next year. I feel like we've got a great team and a great group of guys working together, we just have to find that next little spot of speed, and we will. I feel like next year Chevy's new body is going to be a plus for all of Chevy teams. I'm also looking forward to having this opportunity that we have to get to Homestead. If we make that happen, it's going to be a heck of a finish to the season.

Q: And that first Cup win this year. These things are so hard to win, aren't they?

AD: They're very hard to win. Just to have my name in NASCAR history in winning in the Cup series feels amazing. You never really sit and think about it until you're done racing, and it feels good to have won a race, but I've got a lot more I want to win. I want to be the first guy to win a championship in all three series, that's my ultimate goal.

Q: You placed 13th in the NASCAR Cup regular season standings. How did you feel about your results, and perhaps more importantly, your consistency?

AD: I wish we had more consistency in the top 10, and I feel like we're capable of doing that week-in and week-out. We haven't had it this year. For next year, we need to have a really solid off-season and make sure we get to take our cars, and everything we have going on at RCR, to the next level.

Q: Looking at the competitive landscape with eight races remaining in the playoffs, obviously Martin Truex has looked bulletproof, but is everyone else beatable?

AD: Well, this past weekend there were six Toyotas in the top 12. They've been dominant all year, but we can upset them, you know? There's opportunity there. Those are guys that have a lot of pressure on their shoulders, in my opinion, because of the points gap. If they were able to lose it somehow and it goes to one race, it would be devastating because they've been the favorites all year. Hopefully we can put some of that pressure on at some point.