© Peter Fanning/For IndyStar / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
NASCAR Xfinity Series driver Austin Hill might want to find a comfortable spot on his couch for next week’s race at Iowa.
Hill, who has three wins this year, is facing intense scrutiny and a potential suspension after seemingly intentionally wrecking competitor Aric Almirola during Saturday’s race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
I think Austin Hill is going to be in some trouble here once #NASCAR gets to look at this…
That is so dramatically uncalled for, and I have to say, Hill isn’t going to get the benefit of the doubt because of past instances.
— Joseph Srigley (@joe_srigley) July 26, 2025
The incident occurred with 10 laps remaining in the race after Almirola, who was attempting to pass Hill for fourth place, caused him to slide up the track and nearly wreck. Initially, Hill saved his car, much to the amazement of the broadcasters, but he then turned sharply left, hitting Alimirola and sending him nose-first into the wall.
Alimirola then bounced off the wall and back into Hill, ending both their chances of winning the race.
Austin Hill Says He Wasn’t Trying To Wreck Aric Almirola
Immediately after the crash, Hill came over his team radio and said that he wasn’t not intentionally trying to wreck to Almirola. He claimed that he was trying to straighten out his car and after initially doing so, he lost control of it again.
Team owner Richard Childress then defended his driver after the race.
“I’ll be in bigger trouble than I already am with NASCAR, period,” Childress said when initially asked about the incident.
“He– no,” he added when asked if Hill should be suspended. “They didn’t do a damn thing to the 2 car [of Austin Cindric] when they, he wrecked Ty [Dillon] and admitted to it,” Childress said, via Dustin Long of NBC Sports. “Drove him in the right rear and wrecked him at COTA. It’s who you are. We’re a blue-collar team, they give us trouble all the time.”
Nobody Believes Austin Hill!
While Childress stood up for his driver, it seems that nobody believes Hill!
NASCAR immediately penalized him, making him stop on pit road for five laps while the race restarted. That caused an even bigger crash out from Hill.
“Oh they can go f— themselves. F—NASCAR. That is f—— bulls— … I’m f—— sideways, I go to correct it back to the left. It’s locked to the left and I run into the #19 [Almirola],” he said over his radio.
But Almirola didn’t buy that explanation.
“Oh, it was definitely intentional,” he said in a post-race interview. “He blocked me three times, and I finally got him loose into (Turn) 3. He had damage on the nose, so he was really slow in the corners. It was time to go. We’re coming down to ten laps to go and the leaders are starting to put a gap on us. It’s time to go, I got him loose, and he just turned left and hooked me in the right rear. Honestly one of the biggest hits in my entire NASCAR career. Very reminiscent of the hit I took when I broke my back.”
Neither did Hill’s former teammate Sheldon Creed, who was running right behind the two at the time of the incident. When asked about the incident post-race, Creed laughed and said that it was obvious that Hill wrecked Almirola intentionally.
Nick Payne, the spotter for Cup Series star Tyler Reddick asked simply, “What is wrong with that guy?”
Payne then advised drivers not to wear white gloves, suggesting that the footage clearly showed Hill turning into Almirola.
Austin Hill May Have Ruined His Season
Hill has three victories and six stage wins already this season, meaning he’s locked into the playoffs and already has 21 bonus points. That would be the third-most bonus points of anyone if the season ended today.
Herein lies the problem.
Prior to the season, NASCAR implemented a new rule that states that if a driver misses a race for any unapproved reason, they will forfeit any playoff points they have earned or will earn prior to the start of the playoffs.
Approved reasons include injury, family tragedy, birth of a child, etc. What is not included in the list of exemptions is if a driver misses a race due to suspension.
Historically, incidents like the one involving Hill and Almirola have resulted in a one-race suspension if the driver is deemed to have purposely wrecked and endangered a competitor.
If that holds true here, Hill would enter the playoffs with zero bonus points, making his path to a championship much, much more difficult.
NASCAR usually hands down its post-race penalties on the Tuesday following a race. So Hill will be waiting anxiously for the next 72 hours.