After taking an unlikely tumble down the fronstretch at Las Vegas Motor Speedway last Sunday, Tyler Reddick’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs situation has become dire heading to a racetrack he’s previously thrived at.
The Corning, California native has been among the fastest drivers all weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway, pacing NASCAR Cup Series practice on Saturday and transferring that into a pole position.
With a lap time of 32.248 seconds (167.452mph), Reddick put his No. 45 The Beast Killer Sunrise Toyota Camry XSE on pole for Sunday’s 400-mile contest, his ninth pole in the NASCAR Cup Series.
Reddick enters Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400 at Homestead with a 30-point deficit to the NASCAR Cup Series playoff cutline, which entering the weekend is held by William Byron.
2022 Homestead winner Kyle Larson will start on the outside of the front row for Sunday’s event in his HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro for Hendrick Motorsports.
After barely coming up short of winning last weekend’s event at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Christopher Bell will start from third place. Denny Hamlin, Bell’s teammate at Joe Gibbs Racing, will start outside the second row.
Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., winner at Talladega Superspeedway, was the highest non-playoff driver in time trials on Saturday and will complete the top-five starters at the 1.5-mile facility in Homestead, Florida.
It’s the first top-five start for Stenhouse and JTG Daughterty Racing since last May at Darlington Raceway.
Martin Truex, Jr. will roll from sixth-place in likely his final NASCAR Cup Series event at Homestead-Miami Speedway, while Chase Elliott, Bubba Wallace, Daniel Hemric, and Justin Haley round out the top-10 starters.
Only five of the eight drivers still competing in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs managed to advance into the second qualifying round on Saturday.
All three Team Penske entries struggled mightily in practice and qualifying for Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, with defending NASCAR Cup Series champion Ryan Blaney being the best of the three drivers in 20th-place.
Joey Logano, whose victory last Sunday at Las Vegas made him the first driver to lock into the Championship 4, will start from 26th, after the two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion suffered from power steering issues in practice.
Quite possibly the biggest surprise, though, considering his recent consistency — with four straight top-four results — was William Byron, who qualified 25th in his No. 24 Valvoline Chevrolet Camaro. Byron is the 2021 winner at Homestead, an event he won starting from 31st.
Chad Finchum, driving the No. 66 Green Light Performance Parts Ford Mustang Dark Horse for MBM Motorsports, will bring up the rear of the pack for Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
The Straight Talk Wireless 400 will be broadcast on Sunday, October 27th, at 2:30 PM ET on NBC, MRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Channel 90).
