"Just trying to learn for next time"- Tyler Reddick reflects after obstructing Chris Buescher's maiden win of the season

The closing laps of the 13th Cup Series race at Darlington Raceway witnessed a debacle between Tyler Reddick and Chris Buescher, where the former eyed his second win this season, while the latter aimed for his first. However, the 23XI Racing driver used up some extra track for which both rivals paid the price.

Moving forward, Reddick has reflected on his Goodyear 400 run and opened up about a "lot of things" that shattered his 174 laps of domination and Buescher's second chance to win after he missed the victory by a historic margin of 0.001 seconds against Kyle Larson at the Kansas Speedway.

During the pre-NASCAR All-Star Open presser, the #45 Toyota driver told motorsports reporter Bob Pockrass about the factors contributing to the duo's misery. He said (via X):

"There was a lot of things to go back to look at, you know, aside from me and his [Chris Buesher] situation just within the last restart. The obvious thing is that I drove in so deep that I needed the entire racetrack, I didn't have enough tire left to keep the outside lane open, so just trying to learn for the next time." (0.16)

Reddick was the polesitter while Buescher started his run in third. However, both drivers suffered the blow on Lap 285 after the former's slide job into the latter went wrong and deflated their rear tires. As a result, Tyler finished 32nd and Chris settled in 30th place.

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“I don’t think he went in there to fence him": Tyler Reddick's boss Denny Hamlin defends the former's Darlington incident

Though Tyler Reddick was at the receiving end of criticism from Chris Buescher, according to 23XI Racing co-owner Denny Hamlin, his driver was left with no choice but to make the final move or suffer a drop in his track position as his tires were left with little to no grip.

The high-banked too-tough-to-tame track has 25 degrees of banking on turns 1 and 2, and 23 degrees on turns 3 and 4. This results in a massive degradation of the left tire as the race progresses further and the asphalt eats the rubber.

During the Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin highlighted how Tyler Reddick's efforts to prevent the wreck would've gone in vain because he was "way too late" and laid bare his driver's intention during his battle with the #6 Ford of Buscher. The 43-year-old said:

"I don’t think he went in there to fence him. I think he went in there legitimately thinking that he was going to slide up in front of him. And I think he legitimately realized, halfway through the corner entry, ‘I am screwed and I’m not going to make it.’ Because you saw him get loose, well before they made contact, and you could see that he tried to slow down, but it was way too late." (47.10)

Both Tyler Reddick and Chris Buescher have dropped one place in the standings. The #45 Toyota driver is placed sixth while the #6 Ford driver is six places down in P12.