AVONDALE, Ariz. — With three dramatic wins in as many races this season, 23XI Racing’s Tyler Reddick arrives at Phoenix Raceway for Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 500 feeling confident and hopeful he can extend a historic streak of season-opening excellence to four consecutive NASCAR Cup Series victories to open the year.
After winning the season-opening Daytona 500 on Daytona’s 2.5-mile speedway, Reddick answered with a win on Atlanta’s 1.5-mile EchoPark Speedway and then last weekend re-wrote history by claiming victory at Austin’s Circuit of The Americas road course – three different tracks; one very happy victor, team and organization.
No driver has won the first four races of the season and statistically-speaking, at least, the Phoenix one-miler has loomed as a challenge for the driver of the No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota. Reddick has only a pair of top-five finishes in 12 series starts – two third-place showings, the last coming in this spring race in 2023.
The 30-year-old Californian finished 20th (spring) and 26th (fall season finale) in the two 2025 races. He’s only led laps in two of his 12 starts, but in spring of 2024, his 68 laps out front tied his team co-owner Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin for a race best total.
“When we go to the spring Phoenix race, we’re typically right there,” Reddick said, “I’m really excited to see what we have for speed and pace over the next two weekends because we’ve worked really hard to improve things here.
“We’ve worked hard to kind of re-think how we get around Phoenix and we’ve just kind of doubled down on the things that we’ve been improving at Vegas so honestly, I’ve very excited to see what kind of pace we have at Phoenix and Vegas as it comes up.”
The work is paying off big picture so far. For the first time in its six-year history, the 23XI Racing team boasts the top two drivers in the NASCAR Cup Series championship standings – with Reddick leading teammate Bubba Wallace by 70 points.
The team – also including driver Riley Herbst – has led 206 laps this season – more than double that of any other team. The four-car JGR organization is next closest with a combined 94 total laps out front. And 23XI Racing’s combined six top-10 efforts between the three drivers is also most for any team.
So, who historically-speaking may give Reddick a run for his record-setting dominance? At Phoenix, Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron is in the midst of his own record run – 21 consecutive top-10 stage finishes at the desert one-miler and he leads all drivers in laps run in the top-five and top-10 in the Next Gen car era. He won the 2023 spring race here.
Five drivers finished top-10 in both of the 2025 Phoenix races – Hendrick teammates Chase Elliott, Kyle Larson, Hamlin, Wood Brothers Racing’s Josh Berry and Richard Childress Racing’s Kyle Busch. Larson, who was crowned the NASCAR Cup Series champion for the second time in his career last November at Phoenix, is the only driver to score top-five finishes in both races last season.
And of course, for Hamlin, there is plenty of heartbreak to race through. He led an absolutely dominating 208 of 319 laps in the November Championship Finale, only to lose the race to Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney and the title to Larson in an overtime finish.
The series’ new points system – changed in the offseason – now rewards winning a race more but has eliminated the win-and-you’re-in Playoff system of recent years. The current result is Reddick’s huge lead – and the 70-point differential between he and Wallace – is the same differential between Wallace and 27th place in the standings.