Reddick Strikes Late in the Desert: Phoenix Win Ends the Drought and Upends the Chase

TL;DR

• Tyler Reddick won Sunday's Freeway Insurance 500 at Phoenix Raceway, leading only the final 18 of 312 laps.
• The No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota took two scuffed right-side tires under the final caution, restarted fourth, and ran down the leaders, beating polesitter Ryan Blaney by 0.801 seconds.
• The win was Reddick's sixth of 2026 — the most of any driver — and ended a 23-race winless drought stretching back to Kansas Speedway in April.
• Kyle Larson, who entered Phoenix with a 49-point Chase lead, blew a tire and failed to finish. He now leads Christopher Bell by just five points with three races remaining.
• Toyota clinched its fourth NASCAR Cup Series manufacturers' championship on the strength of 18 wins from 33 races, its first since 2019.

Eighteen laps that changed the season

For six months, the fastest car in NASCAR belonged to a driver who kept forgetting to win. Reddick opened 2026 with a record three straight victories, including the Daytona 500. Then the wins stopped: twenty-three races passed without a trip to Victory Lane.

On Sunday at Phoenix, Reddick barely led at all. He was nowhere near the front for most of the afternoon, and when Kyle Larson's tire let go with fewer than 30 laps remaining, the No. 45 team faced the decision that would define the race: stay out on old tires and protect track position, or gamble.

Chase Briscoe, Chase Elliott and Ty Gibbs stayed out. Crew chief Billy Scott gambled on just two scuffed tires; Reddick restarted fourth behind three cars on older rubber and picked them off one by one.

"I was just surprised, you know, getting to chase that easily," Reddick said afterward. "It was only right-side tires, and they were scuffed, so I was able to get to the inside a lot easier than I thought I was going to, and I cleared him right away, which was very key in getting some distance from the 12."

He beat polesitter Ryan Blaney to the line by 0.801 seconds, banking 61 points and cutting his own Chase deficit from 114 points to 56. It was his sixth victory of the season and the 14th of his Cup career.

"To go six months without getting a win, it was tough on the 45," Reddick admitted. "It was really cool, the way we did it. It was a big day for us in the Chase."

The champion's luck finally ran out

Kyle Larson spent the entire season making the title race look like a formality. The 2025 Cup champion arrived at Phoenix with a 49-point cushion — a lead built on relentless consistency while everyone else took turns falling apart. He leaves the desert clinging to a five-point edge over Christopher Bell, with Briscoe 24 back and Denny Hamlin 31 behind.

A blown tire ended Larson's afternoon early, and just like that, months of careful points management evaporated in one afternoon.

This is the brutal arithmetic of the Chase format: a dominant regular season buys you padding, not immunity. Larson banked that padding all year, and Phoenix reminded everyone why it exists. One mechanical failure at the wrong moment, and a coronation becomes a contest.

Toyota's coronation

Buried under the drama of the finish was the story of the season: Toyota has won the NASCAR Cup Series manufacturers' championship. Eighteen wins in 33 races. A fourth title, and the first since 2019.

The context makes them more so. Toyota arrived in the Cup Series in 2007, decades after Ford and Chevrolet built their empires. Eighteen years later, its nine full-time cars — spread across Joe Gibbs Racing, 23XI Racing and LEGACY MOTOR CLUB — beat both American manufacturers while fielding fewer entries than either rival. No Chevrolet driver has more than two wins all year.

"Our team members at TRD, along with our partners at 23XI Racing, Joe Gibbs Racing and LEGACY MOTOR CLUB, have delivered at the highest level all season," said Tyler Gibbs, president of TRD U.S.A. "This is a very important title for Toyota and TRD because it represents the teamwork, effort and passion of countless people across our organization."

The win distribution tells the story: Reddick's six, Hamlin's four, Briscoe's three, Ty Gibbs' two, Christopher Bell's Southern 500 crown jewel, and part-timer Corey Heim's breakout pair at the inaugural San Diego street race and the Brickyard 400. Six Toyota drivers made the Chase; four remain in definite title contention. Since joining the series, Toyota has won 221 races and 189 poles in 716 starts.

A Chase that got very interesting

Strangest twist: Larson probably owes his surviving lead to the man who beat him. Reddick led only the final 18 laps — but by winning, he kept the victory out of the hands of Bell, Briscoe and Hamlin. Had any of his closest rivals found Victory Lane, Larson's five-point margin might not exist at all.

With three races to go, the championship is suddenly a genuine multi-car fight. Larson's lead is paper-thin. Bell has been the model of consistency. Briscoe has won two Chase races already. Hamlin, the regular-season points king, is still within striking distance. And Reddick — the man with the most wins in the field — has halved his deficit in a single afternoon and suddenly looks dangerous again.

Phoenix has a way of doing this. The one-mile oval rewards the bold late call, and Billy Scott's two-tire gamble is the kind of moment that decides championships. Reddick's drought is over. The Chase, meanwhile, has never been more alive.