Jimmie Allen may be a big budding country music star now, but it wasn’t too long ago that the Delaware native was heading home, having been booted from American Idol.

So hours before American Idol crowned Laine Hardy the latest winner during Sunday's season finale, Allen shared some parting words for the contestants who would be sent home. In short? Don’t sweat it!

“It’s just a restart,” Allen told Taste of Country backstage minutes after taking the stage as an opener on Rascal Flatts Summer Playlist Tour on Saturday (May 18). “Jumping too fast into a career is like putting a car on the road before it has tires, or before it has a transmission. You are just not ready yet. You are in the building process.”

Watch Jimmie Allen's "Make Me Want To" RISERS Performance: 

The "Best Shot" hitmaker and Taste of Country RISERS act recently reminisced about his own rejection from American Idol.

“I watch that video now and I see my face drop, but it wasn’t a, ‘Man, I quit,’” he says. “It was an ‘All right, I’m not ready yet.’ I had to keep going. It’s all about endurance.”

 

His endurance is shining bright at the moment — not only is Allen out on the road with Rascal Flatts, but he'll soon be on tour with Chris Young and Old Dominion. And even after all of these years of climbing towards country music success, Allen knows that he, too, needs to continue to grow.

“Even when you get to the point that you are on the road, you still need maintenance, you still need oil changes, you need tire changes and you still need to put gas in the car,” he says. “So even when you get to that level, you always need to get better.”

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