23XI Racing star Tyler Reddick is the guy to beat as the 2024 Cup Series playoffs culminate this Sunday to crown a regular season champion. He stands atop the points table as a championship favorite with one more regular season race left.
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Although his skills are unmatched and his #45 Toyota Camry XSE blindingly fast, the nature of the postseason will force him to be wary of some wild card races going forward. He spoke about the same topic ahead of the 2024 Cook Out Southern 500 in Darlington.
The first step that the field will take in the postseason will be at Atlanta Motor Speedway. This 1.5-mile quad-oval is more superspeedway than it is an intermediate track and can produce some truly upsetting results. Reddick said, “We’ve seen some pretty chaotic finishes there. Just stack-ups can happen at a bad time and take out a lot of cars.”
Locked in. pic.twitter.com/UdjTLuifv7
— Tyler Reddick (@TylerReddick) August 31, 2024
The second track on his mind was Watkins Glen International. Though The Glen is pretty straightforward as road courses go, he admitted that the tire choice that teams will have this time around could make things a lot more complex. The third and final venue he spoke about was the 0.5-mile Bristol Motor Speedway.
“I think with a place like Bristol, if it remains like it did in the spring then yeah it could just be totally wide open there as well,” he said. “It has all the potential to be a real disaster if you’re not careful.”
These three tracks are what will make up the first round of the playoffs. Reddick expressed his belief that many teams will struggle through these races and potentially fall out of the competition. Mixing and matching strategies intelligently will be crucial to get through the challenges unscathed.
Will Reddick end up as the regular season champion?
The final regular season race at Darlington will decide who gets to enjoy the 15 playoff points that come with being the regular-season champion. The complexity of the first playoff round can be tackled using these points, so Reddick would only be too well aware of how important they are.
He has qualified to start the Southern 500 in sixth place. Up against him for the crown are Kyle Larson (-17) and Chase Elliott (-18). The trio have been playing a cat-and-mouse game for a long time, and their efforts will culminate on Sunday. Larson alone is already a winner of the crown jewel race.
Reddick began the earlier Darlington race in 2024 from pole position and ended up in 32nd place. He will be hoping to avoid such misfortunes this time around. On the brighter side, he finished runner-up in the Southern 500 last year and in third place in 2022. This could be when he finally hits the bullseye.
