23XI Racing has had a tremendous start to the 2026 season, but while Denny Hamlin and Michael Jordan’s camp continue to push their chips to the center of the table, Hamlin isn’t ready to crown his outfit among NASCAR’s heavy hitters like Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing, or Team Penske, even as Bubba Wallace guns for that leap this year.
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On one front, Tyler Reddick has gone back-to-back, first at the Daytona 500 and then the Autotrader 400 at Atlanta. On the other, Wallace has been grinding lap after lap, and the needle is moving. He led 40 laps at Daytona but had to settle for P10 when the dust cleared. Then came Atlanta, where Wallace bagged points with a P2 in Stage 1 and followed it up by cashing in Stage 2.
When the chips were down, Wallace got swallowed by the pack and slipped to eighth after a final-lap gamble. While pacing the field, he went high to slam the door on a move from Carson Hocevar, which bled momentum and left the bottom lane wide open for drivers like Reddick.
Even so, Hamlin poured cold water on the hype during his post-race chat, and Wallace’s desire to beat the dominant three.
When asked if recent runs put 23XI in the “big three” conversation, turning it into a “big four,” Hamlin didn’t bite. “It’s too early for that. I mean, we’re many wins and championships away from that. There’s no question that we’re building fast cars and cars that are capable of winning week in, week out. We don’t always hit the setup or things like that, but we’re working hard.”
“This team being nonexistent six years ago is just amazing that we’re able to do what we did with building this thing from scratch and now having the results week in, week out that is contending with the big guys,” the Joe Gibbs driver added.
Even with Reddick and Wallace sitting one-two in the standings, Hamlin held the line. “Yeah, it’s very early, but it’s not by circumstance. They’re running up front. They’re fast. Again, just doing a lot of the right things. We’re making up for lost time.”
Last season didn’t deliver the wins the team had circled, but now they’re clawing that back. Hamlin sounded like a car owner who knows he has more than one shot in the chamber. When the race didn’t fall Wallace’s way, the team still had Reddick ready to carry the baton. That kind of depth stacks the deck when multiple cars from the same team keep showing up at the front, just like 23XI did at Atlanta.
