Tyler Reddick during pre-race ceremonies for the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona International Speedway. (Photo: Grady Lundberg | The Podium Finish)
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — It has been a rollercoaster season for the 23XI Racing organization so far this year, but on a positive note, they can rest assured that both Bubba Wallace, who won the Brickyard 400 earlier this year, and defending Championship 4 contender Tyler Reddick will both be racing for a NASCAR Cup Series championship once again.
Reddick, who won multiple races on the 2024 campaign, has not seen quite the success that his No. 45 crew would have hoped for since the season started back in February. While his No. 45 Camry XSE has shown the pace that drivers like Wallace and others out of the Joe Gibbs Racing camp have had, Reddick has not been able to keep himself near the front for good results and chances at a potential victory.
Last night, the No. 45 was not on its A-game. From the start of the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona International Speedway, Reddick was mired back in traffic and he was not able to find the front of the field before an incident took place between himself and Todd Gilliland. They were both sent spinning off the exit of Turn 4 on Lap 19, resulting in damage to Reddick’s car when he made contact with the inside SAFER barrier.
At that point, there was only one goal in mind for Reddick, survive and advance into the playoffs. With the points position that the No. 45 had been in going into last night’s action, all Reddick had to do was run the rest of the race and stay out of trouble.
With severe damage to the nose from the earlier accident, the eight-time Cup Series winner did not have the speed to compete for the win, but they had enough juice left in the McDonaldland Toyota Camry to make it to the end of the show. Throughout the remainder of the 400-mile thriller, Reddick kept his car near the back of the field, running just in the wake of the draft, finishing 21st on a night that went sour very quickly.
Tyler Reddick cruising down the backstretch in his No. 45 McDonaldland Toyota Camry XSE during the Coke Zero Sugar 400 from Daytona International Speedway. (Photo: Grady Lundberg | The Podium Finish)
“I’m not really sure how to feel at this moment,” the veteran driver out of Corning, California told FOX Sports in his post-race comments. “Yeah, it’s not how we want to get into the playoffs. It’s just not how we want to cap off the regular season the way we did tonight.”
Even with the playoff berth in mind, Reddick still wants more after having the season he and his team had in the past year.
“We got work to do. I think we are all capable of it, but yeah, it’s been tough. We just continue to make mistakes and not capitalize, so now we got to put it all together when the pressure’s on in the playoffs, so we’ll see how that goes.”
With that result, Reddick locked up his fifth playoff bid of his Cup Series career. The 23XI driver has shown that he can win it all in NASCAR’s top three levels. Back in 2018, when Reddick was with JR Motorsports in the No. 9 machine filling in for a promoted William Byron, the young driver won his first NASCAR Xfinity Series championship. The following season in 2019, Reddick moved over to RCR and won another Xfinity Series championship, proving that he was superb Cup Series material right from the get-go.
Even with the tumultuous year that 23XI as a whole has gone through, getting two of their three cars into the playoff picture has to feel good, knowing the amount of hard work Reddick and Wallace have done to get to this point in the season.
The Cup Series will kick off the Round of 16 next weekend with the Southern 500 from Darlington Raceway, a crown jewel event that could play right into the hands of a driver like Reddick who likes to run right up against the wall at tracks of that caliber.
