Austin Dillon says there's an 'urgency' for Richard Childress Racing to perform

Growing up as the grandson of Richard Childress, Austin Dillon saw firsthand what a successful Richard Childress Racing looked like. 

The 2026 iteration of RCR is the complete opposite. 

Through the first 10 races of 2026, Dillon and his teammate, Kyle Busch, are 24th and 27th in the NASCAR Cup Series standings, respectively. Dillon is yet to score a top-10 finish, while Busch got his first of the year at Talladega on April 26. 

The organization made headlines on Monday when Busch's crew chief, Jim Pohlman, essentially swapped roles with Andy Street, with Street becoming the new shot-caller on the No. 8 pit box moving forward. 

In a Friday news conference at Texas Motor Speedway, Dillon noted that there is a sense of urgency for RCR to get back to Victory Lane. Dillon has the last two wins for the organization at Richmond in 2024 and 2025, while Busch hasn't won in 103 races. 

There's an urgency for RCR to improve

"There's an urgency for sure," Dillon said. "One of the guys in the shop came up to me this week [and said], 'Hey dude, we'll do whatever. We'll stay late. We want to prove who we are as a company and who we've always been. When you think we're down, we're going to pop off a win. I have all the confidence in the world that we can get to where we need to be.

"We're maximizing the capability of our cars from the 3 team side. We need to get the 8 to do that. Kyle had a good meeting with the entire shop floor earlier in the week."

Both Dillon and Busch won a Cup race at Texas in 2020, and both are running a lower series race at the track this weekend. Busch is competing in Friday's Truck Series race (8 p.m. ET, FS1) with Spire Motorsports, while Dillon is driving the No. 3 RCR Chevy in Saturday's O'Reilly Series race (3:30 p.m. ET, the CW).

Quotes provided by NASCAR Media.