Toyota GAZOO Racing – Tyler Reddick
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes
DOVER, Del. (July 19, 2025) – 23XI Racing driver Tyler Reddick was made available to the media on Saturday prior to practice for the NASCAR Cup Series race at the Dover Motor Speedway.
TYLER REDDICK, No. 45 SiriusXM Toyota Camry XSE, 23XI Racing
What kind of concern do you have being in an open car and your contract?
“Everything related to litigation, charters – I don’t have a comment for at this time. Thank you though.”
What updates do you want on the In-Season Challenge and your match-up with Ty Gibbs?
“The last three weeks I feel like we’ve raced around each other a bunch, so I don’t know if I’m going to need any. I feel like that will continue, especially – I don’t know where I saw the stat somewhere on X – I saw that I think 490 some laps that we’ve ran here, we’ve ran like 490 laps within two or three spots of each other, or something like that. It does feel like every time I’ve been at Dover since Ty (Gibbs) has been in the Cup Series, I can at least see him on the track when I’m making laps, and yeah, last year, I finished directly behind him – so I feel like that is going to continue. I feel like we are going to be around each other a lot this weekend. Hopefully, we will have some good hard racing.”
What is your expectation on the new tire at Dover this weekend?
“I don’t know the exact details – but as far as – I believe it is a right side that we run at some of the intermediate style tracks, but yes, the left side is different. The trend with that has been softer tires that lay more rubber – something that goes along with that is marbling outside of the racing lane, but typically when there is more rubber going down on the race track, it is presenting us with more options on the racing surface, especially a place like this. Even last year, when we ran here, it was laying so much rubber down on the track that it was forcing you, late in the runs, to move around to get away from the rubber build up. I feel like we were having so much of it on corner exit, it reminds me of Martinsville. That would be exciting. That would be good. Certainly, would force you to move around off the bottom if the rubber really builds up like that again, and quite possibly could do more of that. Excited to see what that means here. Typically, I felt like, this race track – the more sun, the more heat it has, all of the stuff we talked about just now increases. I think the more that happens, the more wide the surface gets, the more options we have as drivers as the tires wear out.”
Do you anticipate the track to open up quicker with multiple lanes with the new tires?
“Yeah, I mean, that is a guess. I think practice will be telling to some degree. I felt like in years past, we don’t lay a lot of rubber down in practice, and if this tire does lay rubber in practice, or quite a bit of rubber, I think that will be a sign on how much faster the track will rubber in and how much sooner it will fall off a little bit. That’s my thought.”
What makes this track difficult to qualifying at?
“It is a test of your guts. That is for sure. This place, again in practice, you will go out there and you will have some kind of idea on how fast it could possibly be on a cleanish race track, and by the end of the run, you are kind of driving it like you would do it in the race. You get out of the car and you look at some data, and then you go out and go qualify. You get two laps, but realistically, I think it is going to be one lap, so with that you just have to have good notes, you have to be ready, as soon as you get out of the car to put practice behind you until tomorrow or later in the day after you qualified, because the mind set and the approach and how much harder you have to drive the car on those two laps is an extreme. I feel like it is more extreme here than a lot of the race tracks that we go too for qualifying.”
10 years ago, you won here in the Truck Series. How significant is to have the unique Dover trophy?
“For me personally, it was early in my NASCAR career. It was really cool to get a trophy as unique as that. I’ve been fortunate to win some unique trophies over the years, but that is one for me, running Trucks, that was a big deal. Obviously, having a trophy like that is really cool, but in the Truck Series – it is not the full-size trophy, but it is still a trophy nonetheless, I don’t know. I just felt like the year before, I had some issues I was fighting in the car comfort wise. I was motivated to come back here the next year, 10 years ago, and run good. There is something about this place, the way it races, how creative you have to be in the car, how much you have to search – I just love this race track and would love to take home the full-size trophy on Sunday.”
What are the odds that the three guys named Ty or Tyler in the Cup Series would make the final four of the In-Season Challenge?
“Did John Hunter (Nemechek) change his name to Ty yet? (laughter) Yeah, that is pretty wild. There is a lot of things that have happened throughout this that looking back, you would have thought at some point – and it finally happened last week, you would have thought that at some points there would be teammates matched up, and we finally got that, and yeah, it seems if the first two letters in your name are T and Y, you are going to pretty far in this thing, so yeah, very interesting for sure. I think, myself and other drivers talk about it for sure, it is all about execution these weeks – for the most part, everyone is really close on speed that making the right strategy call or having good restarts, avoiding the chaotic, big losses of track position – all of those things really, really matter, and I feel like the In-Season Tournament really has shown that – the drivers that step up to the plate and get it done, and have that ability or find their way through it. I think for my case, I was fortunate throughout it. At Atlanta, Kyle (Larson) unforuntately, got caught up in it, so I was okay there. I really thought me and (Carson) Hocevar were going to be around each other a lot in Chicago, and then he collected about half the field when he had his issue. Sonoma was a real test. (Ryan) Preece, I think was better than us last week, but it came down to the end of the race. We came in and got tires – he did as well, but he got collected in the chaos. We were able to shoot the gap and get through it. The pressure of being behind the guy you have to beat throughout the day, throughout the race is something that can get to you, so you just have to understand it, put it away and use it to motivate yourself to hopefully get back to him and hopefully battle with him. I feel like me and Ty (Gibbs) will most likely be around each other a lot tomorrow and probably today in practice too.”
Can you talk about racing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway?
“We’ve gotten to race the road course, and I got to race on the oval, the full circuit, a couple years back when I was running Xfinity, so it was really cool last year to get in it, get back to running the two-and-a-half mile track with the Next Gen car and see what that’s like. It was really mind blowing to see some of the tendencies you would have to do with that car to make it through the pack. (Kyle) Larson really used that to his advantage last year, and it is going to be interesting to see how much the field has learned from that and how much they apply what he did to what the field is going to do when we go back. It is fun. We did last year – we had that 50 minute practice – you are going out there on stickers and you are going as fast as you can. It is really exhilarating to nail the lap and get it right at a place like that. It is very unforgiving if you miss it – even in a Cup car.”
Are you having a sense of optimism since you are consistently in the top-10, or is it frustration because you haven’t won a race yet this season?
“I would say that – I think it is fair, I think at some degree that we frustrated that we haven’t won for sure, but we’ve been using it as motivation to keep improving and finding speed and increasing the amount of times that we properly execute throughout the race. We haven’t really backed away from the fact that we haven’t won a race. We are just using it motivate. It is crazy. I feel like three weeks ago we were 120 something points behind William Bryon and a lot of those cars up there, and the last couple of weeks we have closed the gap. Sonoma – we didn’t really make up much ground at all – but we were still able to pass my bossman, Denny (Hamlin), in points. I think we are right on that cusp of being right there of having weeks like we’ve had in the last three weeks. I think we can keep closing in on it. If we keep performing at that level, we will continue to find opportunities to battle for wins and hopefully one of those come our way too.”
Were the last three races track specific success?
“It’s Atlanta, and Chicago. I don’t know – I know that Shane (Van Gisbergen) is really good at street courses, and there is a number of guys good at road courses, but something about the way you get around Chicago works for me. I’ve been fast every time we’ve been there. For us to have the speed that we did in Chicago is good, but yeah, Sonoma for us was a weekend where we didn’t have the speed that we wanted, we thought our car drove good, but we were able to put tires on and get the finish. I think this weekend will be really important. We’ve been working really hard the last two months to figure out what we are missing and get some of that speed back, and I think it will be a really important test to see how much progress we’ve made on that. This is a place where yes, you’ve got to run a smooth, clean race. It is easy to make a mistake and get yourself out of it, but we definitely want to unload in practice here today and be top-five on pace for sure.”
What would it mean to you to win a million dollars?
“It would be great. I feel like I’m too busy to think about what I would even do with it, but nonetheless it would be great to have and once I have some free time, maybe if I get some free time during the week, I can think about what I would spend it on, but if anything, you can just put it away and maybe have some fun with the money during the off-season.”
Any chance it might get you back into a dirt car?
“Much less would get me back in the dirt car, that is for sure. It is a tricky balance. I love dirt racing. I always have. That is what got me going in racing. It just a difficult balance. I want to make sure I’ve giving my team, my crew everything I can to be prepared. I think it is really important to do all you can during the week to be prepared, so right now, to able to disappear a night or two a week to go race dirt doesn’t make the most sense, and I’m hoping here soon – I keep saying it – I feel like one day I will just do it. I will be able to do that at some point, but as of right now, it doesn’t look like it is happening.”
Do you think NASCAR made the right choice on the tracks for the In-Season Challenge?
“I don’t think there is a wrong choice, honestly. Yes. I think the tracks that we went too had a sense of some unpredictability to it. They could have done it anywhere, but certainly, the tracks that they chose added to that chaos certainly. Getting going, I felt like Sonoma was kind of the first race in this tournament where it should play out, somewhat naturally, but you still did have a lot of movers late in the race with those restarts. I’m good with it either way. Whatever tracks they want to choose, I’m all for it. It’s been fun, and I’ve enjoyed it.”
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