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Tyler Reddick wins Freeway Insurance 500
23XI Racing driver Tyler Reddick. IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Tyler Reddick wins Freeway Insurance 500, vaults himself back into NASCAR title contention

By Samuel Stubbs  |  Last updated Oct 18, 2026 6:35 PM ET
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Both Sunday's Freeway Insurance 500 at Phoenix Raceway and the NASCAR Cup Series title hunt were flipped on their respective heads in the closing stage of Sunday's race.

Kyle Larson, who entered Sunday's race with a 49-point lead over Denny Hamlin in the standings, had a disastrous afternoon. His No. 5 Chevrolet dropped like a rock early in the race, and his struggles were only compounded when he blew a tire and hit the wall with 31 laps to go, finishing 34th.

That late caution allowed the field to be bunched up for one final restart, which Tyler Reddick took full advantage of. 

Reddick's 23XI Racing teammate, Bubba Wallace, had dominated the previous run. But not only did crew chief Charles Denike opt to take four tires on the final pit stop, which shuffled Wallace from the lead to ninth, but Wallace sped on pit road, taking himself out of contention entirely. 

That put back-to-back winner Chase Briscoe in the race lead, but Reddick, who had two fresh right-side tires as opposed to Briscoe, who stayed out under yellow, made quick work of his Toyota teammate, taking the lead with 18 laps to go. 

Reddick held on from there, scoring his sixth win of the season and his first since Kansas on April 19. 

"That's way too long," Reddick told USA Network of his 23-race winless streak. "The way that we worked there... thinking of Phoenix, we wanted to be a lot better than we were. This group never lost the motivation, never lost the drive to keep finding ways to make ourselves better. Something about today, I had a really good feeling. 

"I think [crew chief Billy Scott] had a really good idea of what we needed to do there, going off what our balance was. I didn't get a good launch [on the last restart]. There was a hole and I got through it."

Polesitter Ryan Blaney finished runner-up, with Chase Elliott, Christopher Bell and Corey Heim rounding out the top five. Joey Logano, Daniel Suarez, Briscoe, Ross Chastain and Ty Gibbs completed the top 10. 

Further complicating the championship battle was the barrage of late-race misfortune for Denny Hamlin, who was running fourth on Lap 223 when he blew a right-rear tire and then sped on pit road, trapping himself a lap down. Hamlin finished 28th and was largely unable to take advantage of Larson's poor result.

Larson leads Bell by five points with three races left in the season. Briscoe is third, 24 points back, while Hamlin (fourth, -31), Blaney (fifth, -40), Logano (sixth, -44) and Reddick (seventh, -56) are all very much in title contention going into the Oct. 25 race at Talladega. 

Notable results

Other notable finishers include Josh Berry in 11th, Carson Hocevar in 12th, Wallace in 17th, Ryan Preece in 18th, Austin Cindric in 19th, William Byron in 21st and Chris Buescher in 22nd. 

Talladega, Martinsville and Homestead will close out the 2026 Cup Series season, with all three races airing on NBC.

Samuel Stubbs
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Hailing from the same neck of the woods as NASCAR Hall of Famer Mark Martin, Samuel has been covering NASCAR for Yardbarker since February 2024. He has been a member of the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) since October of 2024. When he’s not writing about racing, Samuel covers Arkansas Razorback basketball for Yardbarker

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