Tyler Reddick wins at Darlington in
4th NASCAR win this season for Michael Jordan's team
[March 23, 2026]
DARLINGTON, S.C. (AP) — A malfunctioning battery, a cool suit
that got very hot and a big deficit to the leader with less than 50
laps remaining at Darlington Raceway.
The “Track Too Tough To Tame” tested Tyler Reddick in every way
possible Sunday, and this year’s top star in NASCAR naturally passed
with flying colors for his fourth victory of the season.
“I know never to give up,” said Reddick, who broke through after
three runner-up finishes on the tricky 1.366-mile oval. “I think
it’s very fitting that when we finally get our first win here at
Darlington that ‘The Lady in Black’ would test us like that. We’ve
been so close so many times.”
Starting on the pole position for the 23XI Racing team co-owned by
Denny Hamlin and Michael Jordan, Reddick led 77 laps in the No. 45
Toyota for his 12th career victory. Chasing down Brad Keselowski
after his final pit stop, Reddick breezed to a 5.847-second margin
of victory.
Ryan Blaney finished third, followed by Carson Hocevar and Austin
Cindric.
The problems started on the first lap for Reddick, who radioed his
team about an alternator problem that caused his voltage to drop
dangerously low. The team swapped a battery with larger capacity
into his Camry after the first stage, but the charging problems
remained.
Reddick had to toggle off his cockpit fans and the power to his cool
suit, which provides driver comfort through a water circulation
system. During a later pit stop, Reddick pumped water out of the
suit, which had begun to cook because of temperatures in the
high-80s.
“The battery wasn’t charging at all,” Reddick said. “All day long
just not running fans and sweating my tail off inside the race car.
We knew it was going to be physical. Really wore out, but I guess I
don’t need as much of that cooling stuff as I normally have.”
It might not quite have been a performance on par with the “flu
game” that Jordan delivered in Game 5 of the 1997 NBA Finals, but it
still pleased the basketball great.
“Pretty sure it’s frustrating for him because he had an unbelievable
car, and I think the key to him winning was just keeping his head,”
said Jordan, who has been on hand for every Reddick win this season
and got to celebrate Sunday at a track he attended with his family
decades ago as a child growing up in North Carolina. “We just had to
get the car right, and I think he did an unbelievable job. I just
wanted everything to be good, because once he gets back out there,
then I feel like his competitive juices are going to carry him all
the way to the end. He earned it all week, and I’m real proud of the
team.”
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Tyler Reddick, center, celebrates in Victory Lane after winning a
NASCAR Cup Series auto race, Sunday, March 22, 2026, in Darlington,
S.C.(AP Photo/Matt Kelley)
Keselowski led a race-high six times for 142 laps.
But the Roush Fenway Keselowski driver made his final pit stop four
laps earlier than Reddick, who made the most of fresher rubber to
erase a seven-second gap and complete the winning pass on the 266th
of 293 laps.
“We didn’t have the best car today, not compared to Tyler,”
Keselowski said. “Tyler drove a hell of a race, and he’s driving a
rocket and making it count right now.”
Reddick began the season with a Daytona 500 win on
the way to becoming the first driver in NASCAR history to win the
first three races of the season. He joined NASCAR Hall of Famers
Dale Earnhardt (1987) and Bill Elliott (1992) as the only Cup
drivers to win four of the first six races in a season.
Reviewing a new rules package
Tire management always matters on Darlington’s abrasive surface, and
drivers wrestled Sunday with increased wear because of new car
regulations.
But despite predictions of chaos from a 12% increase of horsepower
and a 25% reduction in downforce (which helps maintain traction
through the turns at high speed), drivers mostly kept their cars
from careening out of control.
The race featured four yellow flags — including only one for a
multicar incident — the fewest caution periods at Darlington since
there were three in the March 21, 1999, race that was shortened by
rain. The last full-length race at Darlington with fewer than four
cautions was the 1998 Southern 500, which had two yellows on Sept.
6, 1998.
“A lot of fun today sliding around,” said Blaney, who overcame two
mediocre pit stops for a career-best third at Darlington. “I thought
the package was really fun.”
Tame start
Despite predictions of nonstop chaos because of the new car
regulations, the first 91 laps unfolded under the green flag without
interruption. It marked the fifth consecutive race in which the
first stage was completed with the caution flag staying holstered.
Up next
The NASCAR Cup Series will race at Martinsville Speedway, the first
short track of the 2026 season, on Sunday, March 29. A year ago,
Denny Hamlin snapped a 31-race winless streak with his first victory
in 10 years at Martinsville, where he has a series-leading six wins.
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