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Bubba Wallace's crew chief, Charles Denike, recently shared his thoughts on the No. 23 Toyota team's capability to venture deep into the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs. After an eventful sixth race of the season at Homestead-Miami Spedway, Denike believes the 23XI Racing's entry has checked boxes for the season's first phase.
Wallace, the two-time NASCAR Cup race winner, was paired with Denike after veteran crew chief Bootie Barker decided to step down from the role. While the 31-year-old Wallace and Denike started the 2025 campaign strong with a top-five finish in the exhibition race at Bowman Gray Stadium, it took the duo six points-paying race to secure another top-five finish at last weekend's race in Miami.
Nevertheless, Bubba Wallace's right-hand man believes the No. 23 team has shown high optimism and claimed to have made a big step by not being in the points deficit after the first five races. Speaking to SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, Denike said:
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"We believe we do have what it takes to make a deep playoff run, and that's how we started off the beginning of the year. And the first big step for us was five races into the year on not being in a points deficit that changed the way we wanted to proceed for the next 15 or so races into the season, so that we could race in a normal fashion on a weekly basis because we weren't racing from behind on a point deficit."
While Denike acknowledged the underwhelming runs in a couple of races, he believes the Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin-owned NASCAR team has shown potential to succeed and have a successful playoff run through the post-season. He added:
"So Homestead being race six was kind of the first one where we felt like we were outside of that initial cut that we wanted to get through as we started the year."
On the other hand, Bubba Wallace reflected on his recent run at the 1.5-mile in Florida and claimed to have "speed" after a P3 finish.
Bubba Wallace opens up on an eventful outing at Homestead-Miami Speedway
After the season's sixth race, Bubba Wallace made a huge leap in the points standings and now sits in sixth place. With one top-five and one top-10 finish, the Alabama native has also won a stage and has led 98 laps.
Soon after, his best finish of the season, Wallace integrated with reporter Jamie Little at Homestead-Miami and reflected on his impressive finish at the Straight Talk Wireless 400 race.
"It was really good," Wallace said. We showed up here in Miami and had speed. That’s the first box you want to check. We all know when you’re a racecar driver you want to show up and be competitive and we were that."
Bubba Wallace and the No. 23 Toyota team will now return to action for the Cook Out 400 race at Martinsville Speedway on March 30.
