Reddick Wins Michigan in Second Day Double Overtime

(BROOKLYN, MI – AUG 19, 2024 – RIS) Talladega winner earlier this year Tyler Reddick held off challenges from William Byron to win the rain-interrupted FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway. Byron finished second, with Ty Gibbs, Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski completing the top five finishing positions.

Denny Hamlin’s crew spent two pace lap pit stops repairing the rear aero pieces on the No. 11 car, sending Hamlin to the rear of the pack at the restart from yesterday’s rain-interrupted FireKeepers Casino 400. The race restarted with Chase Elliott leading Kurt Busch into the first turn. Kyle Busch, trying to extend his streak of winning in every season, moved around Elliott into the lead after just a handful of laps. 

Martin Truex Jr took the lead from Busch, moving out to almost a half-second lead ahead of Elliott as Busch dropped back to fourth, behind Bubba Wallace. William Byron moved to seventh from restarting in 27th place after Sunday’s red flag. Austin Cindric tapped the wall after an attempted pass but continued with no caution flag flying.

Green flag pit stops for fuel and tires started to scramble the running order, with Truex staying out longer than most before making his call in the pits after leading for 27 laps.

Caution flew for three nearly simultaneous rear tire failures on the cars of Logano, Allmendinger and Gilliland. Logano’s failed in a straight and he managed to get to the pits. Allmendinger had to be towed in and Gilliland also continued to the pits. 

The green flag came out with five laps left in the stage but Larson, Buescher, Gilliland, Chastain, Wallace, Chase Briscoe and more crashed when Larson’s car got loose and spun in the middle of the pack. The caution ended the second stage of the race, with Kyle Busch scoring the season’s first stage win for himself and Richard Childress Racing’s teams.

“Yeah, I just messed up,” admitted Larson. “You try to get all you can on restarts. I was just trying to funnel myself up the racetrack. I didn’t want to get stuck on the bottom three-wide. Just got myself in an awkward aero spot and lost it. It’s unfortunate. I made a mistake and cost ourselves a lot of points today.

“Yeah, I mean you get a little bit of warning right before you start spinning. But once these Next Gen cars step out, it’s really hard to save it. I was just doing what I thought would be right to funnel our way up and just put myself in bad spot.”

Busch, Byron and Keselowski led to the restart, with some position swapping among the leaders until the race settled down with Byron leading, then Busch, Gibbs, Blaney and Keselowski, but the lead between Byron and Busch opened to four tenths of a second, with Gibbs, then Keselowski both moving around Busch as his older tires cost him lap speed.

Corey LaJoie’s spin and rollover brought out a caution on lap 135. The car started to spin as he passed Noah Gragson and immediately lifted into the air, sliding a long way on its roof before getting launched into a pair of rolls when it hit the grass before slamming down on its wheels. LaJoie immediately dropped the window net and got out of the car as the emergency crew arrived.

“That’s just about how the year has gone. We have a good car and I find a way to flip it upside down. Twice this year, we’ve been upside down and I hadn’t been upside down my whole career,” LaJoie lamented. 

“The No. 10 (Noah Gragson) chopped me a couple of times, especially off (turn) two when I’d have a run. I hadn’t seen a replay yet, if he pulled it off the wall when I was trying to get to his left rear to slow him down. But it was a ride, buddy. There were sparks, dirt and all sorts of stuff coming in.”

When you’re racing the No. 10 (Noah Gragson), how hard was it to get off of him? I saw that coming off turn two, it’s really hard with the aero..

“Well, you’re trying to pack air on him. You’re trying to formulate runs. He closed the door pretty late on me a couple of different times, and I was trying to get by him. Just misjudged it and wrecked.”

Byron and Elliott led the restart, with Elliott taking the point, with Keselowski, Gibbs and Byron settling into the top positions, followed by Byron and Reddick. Byron pitted first among the leaders, possibly setting a late-race strategy.

Martin Truex’ spin in the fourth turn set up an overtime finish, with William Byron leading until Ross Chastain looped on the back straight to set up a second overtime restart. 

Byron restarted on the outside as the control car, with Reddick moving ahead and holding the lead to the checkered flag with a margin of 0.168 second ahead of Byron.

The “last couple of days have been tough,” said Reddick after the race, referring to his mentor, dirt track late model star Scott Bloomquist, who died in a crash of one of his vintage aircraft over the weekend.

Unofficial Results: FireKeepers Casino 400, August 18&19, 2024 - Michigan International Speedway
Fin, Str, Driver, Car, Laps, St1, St2, Tms Led, Laps Led, Playoff Pts, Pts, Status
 1) 2, Tyler Reddick, No. 45 McDonald's Toyota, 206, , , 3, 15, 5, 40, Running
 2) 9, William Byron, No. 24 RaptorTough.com Chevrolet, 206, 3, 4, 2, 20, , 50, Running
 3) 19, Ty Gibbs, No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota, 206, , 3, 1, 2, , 42, Running 
 4) 13, Kyle Busch, No. 8 Lucas Oil Chevrolet, 206, 6, 1, 3, 24, 1, 48, Running
 5) 15, Brad Keselowski, No. 6 Castrol Edge Ford, 206, 7, 6, 1, 2, , 41, Running
 6) 18, Chris Buescher, No. 17 Fifth Third Bank Ford, 206, 5, , , , , 37, Running
 7) 27, Zane Smith #, No. 71 Focused Health Chevrolet, 206, , , , , , 30, Running
 8) 12, Daniel Suarez, No. 99 Jockey Infinite Cool Underwear Chevrolet, 206, , , 1, 7, , 29, Running
 9) 1, Denny Hamlin, No. 11 Yahoo! Toyota, 206, , , , , , 28, Running
10) 11, Carson Hocevar #, No. 77 Premier Security/Zeigler.com Chevrolet, 206, , , 1, 3, , 27, Running
11) 26, Ryan Preece, No. 41 United Rentals Ford, 206, , , , , , 26, Running
12) 25, Noah Gragson, No. 10 Overstock.com Ford, 206, , , , , , 25, Running
13) 30, Ricky Stenhouse, No. 47 Country Crock/Minute Rice Chevrolet, 206, , , 1, 2, , 24, Running
14) 34, Harrison Burton, No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford, 206, , , 1, 5, , 23, Running
15) 6, Chase Elliott, No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet, 206, 2, , 2, 29, , 31, Running
16) 28, Erik Jones, No. 43 Dollar Tree Toyota, 206, , 8, , , , 24, Running
17) 10, Austin Dillon, No. 3 DOW MobilityScience Chevrolet, 206, , 5, , , , 26, Running
18) 8, Ryan Blaney, No. 12 Menards/Dutch Boy Ford, 206, 1, 10, 2, 15, 1, 30, Running
19) 17, Michael McDowell, No. 34 Martin Transportation Systems Ford, 206, , , , , , 18, Running
20) 29, Justin Haley, No. 51 Fraternal Order of Eagles Ford, 206, , , , , , 17, Running
21) 36, Cody Ware, No. 15 Parts Plus Ford, 206, , 9, , , , 18, Running
22) 16, Josh Berry #, No. 4 Overstock.com Ford, 206, , , 1, 4, , 15, Running
23) 32, Daniel Hemric, No. 31 Poppy Bank Chevrolet, 206, , , , , , 14, Running
24) 24, Martin Truex, No. 19 Auto-Owners Insurance Toyota, 206, 8, 7, 2, 28, , 20, Running
25) 7, Ross Chastain, No. 1 Busch Light Peach Chevrolet, 205, 10, 2, 1, 4, , 22, Running
26) 5, Bubba Wallace, No. 23 McDonald's Toyota, 205, 4, , 1, 5, , 18, Running
27) 22, Alex Bowman, No. 48 Ally Chevrolet, 205, 9, , , , , 12, Running
28) 23, Austin Cindric, No. 2 Discount Tire Ford, 204, , , , , , 9, Running
29) 33, John Hunter Nemechek, No. 42 Mobil 1 Toyota, 202, , , , , , 8, Running
30) 35, AJ Allmendinger(i), No. 16 LeafFilter Gutter Protection Chevrolet, 200, , , , , , 0, Running
31) 21, Chase Briscoe, No. 14 HighPoint.com Ford, 157, , , , , , 6, Suspension
32) 31, Corey LaJoie, No. 7 Garner Trucking Chevrolet, 135, , , , , , 5, Accident
33) 14, Joey Logano, No. 22 Shell Pennzoil Ford, 117, , , , , , 4, Accident
34) 4, Kyle Larson, No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet, 115, , , 3, 41, , 3, Accident
35) 3, Christopher Bell, No. 20 Rheem Toyota, 115, , , , , , 2, Accident
36) 20, Todd Gilliland, No. 38 Grillo's Pickles Ford, 114, , , , , , 1, Accident
(i) Ineligible for driver points in this series, (#) Rookie

Race Length: 206 Laps, 412 Miles
Time of Race: 3 Hrs, 2 Mins, 12 Secs.
Average Speed: 135.675 mph
Margin of Victory: .168 Seconds

Stage 1 Top 10: 12, 9, 24, 23, 17, 8, 6, 19, 48, 1
Stage 2 Top 10: 8, 1, 54, 24, 3, 6, 19, 43, 15, 12

Comments: Tyler Reddick has won the FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway, his seventh career victory in the NASCAR Cup Series.

Cautions: 7 for 41 laps;
Laps: 39-42 (No. 11 Spin Turn 4 [4]);
47-55 (Stage 1 Conclusion [Red Flag: 17:15:18] [None]);
110-115 (Debris Turn 4 [11]);
117-125 (No. 5, 14, 17, 20, 22, 23, 38 Incident Turn 4 [None]);
137-141 (No. 7, 10 Incident Backstretch [34]);
196-199 (No. 19 Incident Turn 4 [15]);
201-204 (No. 1 Spin Backstretch [51]).

Lead Changes: 26 among 16 drivers;
D. Hamlin 0;
K. Larson 1-34;
B. Wallace 35-39;
R. Blaney 40-47;
C. Elliott 48-57;
K. Busch 58-65;
M. Truex 66-92;
R. Blaney 93-99;
T. Gibbs 100-101;
B. Keselowski 102-103;
K. Larson 104-105;
M. Truex 106;
K. Larson 107-111;
R. Chastain 112-115;
K. Busch 116-126;
W. Byron 127-141;
C. Elliott 142-160;
T. Reddick 161;
K. Busch 162-166;
D. Suarez 167-173;
C. Hocevar # 174-176;
R. Stenhouse 177-178;
H. Burton 179-183;
J. Berry # 184-187;
T. Reddick 188-199;
W. Byron 200-204;
T. Reddick 205-206.