Nobody expected the Richard Childress Racing duo of Kyle Busch and Austin Dillon to be world-beaters during the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season, but RCR is off to a historically bad start to the 2026 campaign.
For the first time since 1982, RCR has failed to score a top-10 finish in the first six races of a season. That stat takes on more meaning this season given that RCR is putting two full-time entries on the track along with a part-time third car for drivers Jesse Love and Austin Hill.
The last time RCR went six races into a year without recording a top 10 was 1982, when a then-25-year-old Ricky Rudd struggled in his first year with the organization before breaking through with a ninth-place run at North Wilkesboro.
Kyle Busch, Austin Dillon need momentum
Busch and Dillon need a similar shot in the arm this weekend at Martinsville.
Busch and Dillon are 23rd and 26th in the Cup Series standings, respectively, through six races. Busch has only two top-15 runs so far, while Dillon has only one, and neither Hill nor Love broke into the top-20 in their lone starts.
There just isn’t any speed inside the Cup portion of the RCR shop at the moment.
That’s not shocking given the team’s decline since the first half of 2023, when Busch, who won three races early in the 2023 campaign, suddenly fell off. Dillon has yet to have a true breakout season in his Cup Series career, and neither RCR driver is in their prime.
If Dillon, Busch and Hill all finish outside of the top 10 at Martinsville on March 29, Richard Childress Racing will have gone through the first seven races without a top-10 result for the first time in history. That would only increase the level of concern around one of NASCAR’s most historic organizations as it searches desperately for answers.