Tyler Reddick breaks down incident that led to flip at Las Vegas

Everything seemed to be going well for Tyler Reddick at Las Vegas Motor Speedway over the weekend, as he looked to lock himself into the Championship 4.

The NASCAR Cup Series Regular Season Champion won the opening stage of the race, and looked primed to compete for the win. However, when he looked to make it three-wide with Martin Truex Jr. and Chase Elliott on lap 89, that all changed.

Reddick had a run, but the three-wide maneuver put everyone in a bad position, and Elliott made contact with the No. 45. Both drivers crashed, collecting Brad Keselowski, but Reddick got the worst of it by far, flipping and rolling across the track. Afterwards, he tried to make sense of what went down in Sin City.

“Yeah, you just have to be aggressive on restarts. It’s obviously how the Next Gen racing has been from the beginning,” Reddick explained, via NBC Sports. “I kind of saw them both have a moment, and I just had to split second make a decision. You have to be aggressive on the restart. It is hard to pass after a while. Being myself on a mile and a half, being aggressive – by the time I realized I was in trouble, (Martin Truex Jr.) started sliding and (Chase Elliott) was coming up, and I was pretty much already on their outside at that point, with nowhere to really go.

I needed to make the decision earlier when I saw them sliding to be more conservative to avoid an incident – just not who I am, but it is unfortunate. It took us out of the race. We had a really, really fast Toyota Camry, probably would have been in the mix all race long, but we will go to Homestead – a place where I have had to get it done before and go for it there.”

While Las Vegas ended up being a nightmare for Reddick, as he finished P36 on the afternoon, his confidence remains unshaken. He’s ready for Homestead, and it wasn’t all bad for him in Sin City, as he did get a major boon in the playoff standings with his Stage 1 victory.

“We can still have a good day at Homestead and be in the mix in Martinsville,” Reddick explained. “Ideally, yeah, it would have been nice to win today. It would be nice to win next week, and that is what we will focus on, but thankfully we got 10 stage points in stage one, and it’s not like we are absolutely out of it on points, yet. We are going to have to be perfect here on out, probably.”

Time will tell if Tyler Reddick and the No. 45 team can be as perfect as they need to be, but with everything on the line, don’t count out the talented 23XI Racing wheelman.

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