One of four semifinalists who remain alive in NASCAR’s inaugural In-Season Challenge, Tyler Reddick for the most part doesn’t know what to expect on Sunday at Dover Motor Speedway.
That’s especially true after rain washed out both qualifying and practice on Saturday at the Monster Mile, leaving Cup Series drivers to face a green track with largely untested race cars.
Reddick does have one expectation for the race, though. It’s that he’ll be virtually glued to Ty Gibbs, the driver he’s set to battle head-to-head for a berth in next weekend’s In-Season Challenge finale at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
No Clear Favorite Seemingly Exists Between Tyler Reddick And Ty Gibbs At Dover
Although Ty Gibbs is seeded much higher than Tyler Reddick in the In-Season Challenge’s NCAA Tournament-style bracket, which initially featured 32 drivers, the numbers mean virtually nothing.
Reddick, after all, is ranked much higher than Gibbs in the NASCAR Cup Series standings, and neither driver has gone to Victory Lane in 2025. Plus, the In-Season Challenge has produced myriad surprises over its first three weekends.
Furthermore, Reddick and Gibbs have a fairly comparable history at Dover in terms of results.
Just consider:
- Reddick has made six Cup starts at the Monster Mile. Gibbs has made two.
- Gibbs has a better average finish (11.5) than Reddick (14.5) at the high-banked concrete oval.
- Reddick owns two top-10 finishes at Dover. Gibbs has earned one top-10 finish at the Delaware track.
With NASCAR having set the grid for Sunday according to the NASCAR rule book after a qualifying rainout, Reddick will start fourth. Gibbs will roll off ninth.
Reddick, who must simply finish better than Gibbs to advance, doesn’t anticipate getting many in-race updates from his team about where his In-Season Challenge rival is running.
“The last three weeks, I feel like we’ve raced around each other a bunch, so I don’t know if I’m going to need any,” said Reddick, who competes for the 23XI Racing organization co-owned by Denny Hamlin and NBA legend Michael Jordan.
23XI Racing Driver Dishes On Prize Money And The Odds Of A Close Battle With Ty Gibbs
Speaking during a Saturday media availability at Dover, Tyler Reddick seemed most intrigued by a statistic he stumbled upon earlier in the week on social media platform X. The stat compared him to Ty Gibbs at Dover, but it went deeper than just their finishes.
“I saw that, I think, of the 490 some laps that we’ve both ran here, we’ve ran like 490 laps within two or three spots of each other, or something like that,” Reddick said. “It does feel like every time I’ve been at Dover since Ty has been in the Cup Series, I can at least see him on the track when I’m making laps. And last year (at Dover), I finished directly behind him. So, I feel like that is going to continue.
“I feel like we are going to be around each other a lot this weekend.”
Whoever finishes best between the two will square off with Ty Dillon or John Hunter Nemechek for the In-Season Challenge title at Indianapolis. With that title comes a $1 million payday.
“I feel like I’m too busy to think about what I would even do with the money, but nonetheless, it would be great to have,” Reddick said. “And once I have some free time, maybe if I get some free time during the week, I can think about what I would spend it on.
“But, if anything, you can just put it away and maybe have some fun with the money during the off-season.”
