2 weeks Ago By Rory Robinson
Tyler Reddick was left scratching his head in confusion after his performance during the second race of the NASCAR Playoffs at Watkins Glen. The 23XI Racing driver dealt with an early spin-out during Lap 25 and ongoing tire issues throughout the race, still not truly understanding what affected his vehicle. Reddick was leading the pack and on his way to a Stage 1 win, but a spin-out caused by contact with Daniel Suarez left Reddick fighting to stay competitive through the rest of the race .
"The whole second stage was just riding around," Reddick said to Express U.S. Sports .
"I was trying to pass a couple of cars, but we couldn’t. The tires were just cooked from the spin and the slide." Reddick still managed to secure some points with a seventh-place stage 1 finish.
But the challenges kept mounting, leaving Reddick and his team scratching their heads over the car’s performance by the end of the race. Denny Hamlin has made feelings clear on 23XI 'conflict' in NASCAR Championship battle EXCLUSIVE: Tyler Reddick's Michael Jordan insight speaks volumes about NBA legend "It was tricky," Reddick admitted when reflecting on managing the tire wear. Goodyear made the race more difficult after announcing that it would feature a different tire set .
"I feel like it was something we did a really good job of during the tire test and in practice. At the start of the race, I didn’t feel like we did too much damage to the tires, and we could hold on okay, but after we spun and started stage two, those tires were killed." Reddick’s frustrations continued into the third stage as he attempted to claw his way back into contention.
"Even into stage three, when we tried to make some forward progress back to the front, it was really difficult. When you’re in the middle of the pack on restarts, defending your position, it just cooked our tires." The No.
45 driver explained that his team thought his car had a bent toe link, which is part of its suspension. To replace the damaged part, they gave up about 10-12 spots on the track in the race. After taking it apart and replacing the toe link, they realized nothing was actually wrong with it.
The pit stop move cost them valuable track position and a setback that left them too far back during the last restart, where they got caught up in another accident. "It was just a head-scratching day for sure," he added. "Our car definitely wasn't 100 percent by the end of the race before that last crash, but with everything that we have to look at suspension wise, everything else on the car doesn't point to significant damage.
" DON'T MISS NASCAR Cup Series Playoff trio received huge Watkins Glen benefit Tyler Reddick explains why he was so frustrated in NASCAR post-race interview Denny Hamlin admits excessive addition in $9.7 million mansion to Tyler Reddick "So we're sitting here certainly today still scratching our heads a little bit trying to understand what it is that cost that caused us to lose a second and a half of pace," he continued. "Typically when you lose that much speed something is significantly damaged or wrong on the car and we just haven't found that.
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