By AMANDA VINCENT
Tyler Reddick recorded a 23.749-second/113.689 mph lap in the second of two rounds of NASCAR Cup Series qualifying at Richmond (Va.) Raceway on Saturday to claim the pole for Sunday’s Cook Out 400. It’s Reddick’s fifth-career pole but his first of 2023.
Reddick will share the front row of Sunday’s starting grid with Kyle Busch. Reddick was fourth and Busch fifth-fastest among the five drivers advancing to round two from group B in the opening round.
“I think the real turning point for me was on lap one,” Reddick said. “I forget. I was acting like I only had one lap in that first round, even though I had two. I knew that lap was going to be really close, and I kind of got out of shape out of turn four. I pretty much knew I was going to hit the wall, but I knew I wasn’t going to make the second round with that first lap. I stayed in it; hit the wall pretty good, but was able to transfer into the second round with that first lap and saved a lap on those tires. We didn’t have the recovery time that group A had to cool the tires off, but running that one lap set us up pretty well for round two. I think a lot of drivers and teams were not generally expecting the pace fall-off to be that much. We were able to observe that and have an idea that what we would need for a lap time in round two, and it just worked out really, really well. I’m really excited to be on the pole for the first time this year with 23XI. We’ve been really strong when we’ve had the opportunities to qualify this year, and it is nice to get that first pole as a team, and just to top it off even more than that, the West Coast Customs Toyota Camry is getting build outside the race track and is going to be at the front of the field tomorrow. I get to make some laps in it as well and now our car is going to be up next to it. That’s also really cool.”
Denny Hamlin led group A drivers in the opening round with a 23.559-second/114.606 mph lap. He qualified third.
Kevin Harvick was the first of only two drivers to surpass the 115 mph mark in qualifying, leading group B in round one with a 23.359-second/115.587 mph lap. Martin Truex Jr. was the other, also posting the fast lap in round one.
Harvick, the only Ford driver to advance to the final round wound up qualifying eighth. Truex wound up 10th.
Other top-10 qualifiers included Chase Elliott in fourth, Darrell “Bubba” Wallace Jr. in fifth, William Byron sixth, Ty Gibbs seventh and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. in ninth.
