O'Reilly Auto Parts is a major U.S. automotive parts retailer that sponsors NASCAR series and teams. In the transcript, it refers to the O'Reilly Auto Parts series context tied to Tyler Reddick’s earlier success.
A “back-to-back champion” means winning the championship in consecutive seasons. In NASCAR, that’s a major achievement because it requires consistent performance across an entire year, not just a few races.
In NASCAR, switching teams can be a big deal because each team has different cars, setups, crew chiefs, and resources. Winning championships with two different teams highlights adaptability and strong driver-team chemistry.
A “flow state” is a mental condition where performance feels effortless and highly focused. In racing, drivers often describe being in a flow state when car feedback, track position, and decision-making all click together.
RCR typically refers to Richard Childress Racing, a well-known NASCAR organization. The transcript credits Reddick’s first year at RCR in the O'Reilly car with a run of wins, linking team environment to on-track results.
Company
GM Motorsports
GM Motorsports is General Motors’ racing involvement—basically the GM-backed side of racing. Mentioning it here connects the driver’s earlier championship to a manufacturer-supported program.
A “regular season championship” is a title awarded based on performance during the regular portion of the season (before the playoffs-style finale). It signals sustained speed and results across many races, not just peak performance at the end.
They’re talking about how people online are reacting and talking a lot about what happened on track. Fans often analyze every detail and share theories.
Even if two cars go through the same turn, they can do it differently. One driver might focus on getting into the turn, while the other focuses on getting out of it faster.
Downforce is what helps press the car down onto the track. More downforce usually means better grip in turns; less downforce means the car can feel looser.
Horsepower is the engine’s power output. More horsepower generally helps you accelerate harder and faster, which matters a lot on a track where you’re going flat-out.
“Lapping the field” means you’re so fast that you pass every other car and get a full lap ahead of them. It usually happens when one team is clearly quicker.
They’re talking about different race tracks, and how the team’s performance can change from one track to another. Track shape and speed matter a lot for how the car feels and handles.
They’re naming two tracks on the NASCAR schedule. The point is that the car setup that works well at one track may not work the same at another, so teams measure performance track-by-track.
Short tracks are tighter and more stop-and-go than bigger tracks. That means the car has to be set up to handle lots of braking and turning without getting loose or losing grip.
Concept
short run vs long run
A “short run” is the car’s early performance, and a “long run” is how it feels later as tires wear out. Good drivers and teams set up the car to stay competitive across both.
“Come from the back” means you start near the last cars and have to work your way forward. It’s harder because you’re stuck dealing with other cars right away.
“Extra power” means the car accelerates harder. On a race track, that can help you get up to speed faster out of turns.
Concept
strengths and weaknesses
They’re basically saying their best skills and their problem areas can change depending on the track. If the setup matches their strengths, they can lose less time.
Concept
Richmond
Richmond is another NASCAR venue the team references as a place where they’ve been able to bring speed. The implication is that improvements to braking should translate into better performance at other tracks as well.
Concept
Loudon
“Loudon” refers to New Hampshire Motor Speedway, a track where braking and traction balance matter because of its layout and cornering demands. The speaker’s point is that brake improvements should help the car perform across different track types.
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So, I'm going to tell you this, Tyler. I'm going to make a deal with you.
You guys pull it off at Martinsville.
I will shave a 45 into my hair.
If I can figure out how Martinsville, there's no trouble.
Welcome to the Kevin Harvick Happy Hour Podcast.
This is the Victory Lab. This week with your boy, Mamba Smith.
And we have this guy named Tyler Reddick.
Tyler, welcome to the show. Thank you for your time.
What a run you've been on, winning four of the first six races.
What has this run been like? How are you feeling right now?
It's pretty great.
You know, you're in a really good place when, you know, I think it was after Vegas,
we were all joking, like, hey, guys, we had a little get-together here
at Airspeed, and I was like, guys, we got to sort this out.
We haven't won in two weeks, like, get it together, you know what I mean?
So, yeah, it's fun to be able to, you know, joke like that
and have that level of confidence going into a race weekend.
Yeah, I mean, two of these four wins have come at, arguably,
some of my best racetracks on the schedule.
I don't know. I haven't had the results of Atlanta,
but I feel like you could put that up there as one of my better racetracks, too.
So, yeah, I'd be able to capitalize on this speed
and be able to win like we have overcome the issues we faced.
It's pretty cool considering last year, you know,
these little hiccups we'd have throughout the day
would set us far enough back to not win.
Do you feel like when you think about your career
and what you did in the O'Reilly Auto Parts series,
being back-to-back champion, doing it with two different teams,
you kind of were on runs like this before.
Does it feel similar like that?
Like, is it as enjoyable as those moments?
Or is this even, obviously, it's more because it's cup series,
but I feel like you're in the same flow state.
Yeah, that's a good point.
You know, the way we're able to rattle off wins
that my first year at RCR in the O'Reilly car,
that was special to be able to, you know,
yeah, we won the championship at GM Motorsports,
be able to follow it up with race wins, regular season championship,
and then ultimately the championship.
So, yeah, that was cool.
I feel like we're in a similar place,
but, like, happiness-wise, if you will, but...
Yeah.
It's definitely more meaningful now being a dad,
everything that goes into it, the amount of, you know,
the amount of people involved, you know,
on this race team, a part of 2311.
Yeah, I mean, I think just on the cup side,
it just means more, you know, for a number of reasons.
It's just, it's so hard to be able to show up
and win every single week.
We've been able to do that mostly.
But, um, yeah, it's just,
it's really tough on the cup side right now,
and when you can show up to the racetrack
and nail it that good, it's a huge deal.
I mean, we got to talk about it.
Social media, you guys got social media buzzing.
They don't believe that the 45 is its fastest
for the internet just on its own.
They feel like you guys got something else going on.
I call Ronius on all accounts.
I think you guys just put in a lot of work over the winter.
Do you hear all the, all the chatter on social that,
oh, it's because of the lawsuit.
They won the lawsuit and NASCAR is giving them all this stuff.
Do you hear all that or you guys just block it out?
I, uh, it gives me a good laugh.
Um, you know, yeah, it is what it is.
Um, I feel like when I was younger, I would remember,
I remember people, you know,
when, when Kyle Bush would get rolling and rattle off some wins,
like people have a lot to say about him.
Um, trying to think of one of the more recent ones
that like come to mind.
But, um, yeah, I mean, I guess winning four out of six is,
is pretty, pretty uncommon.
Um, but yeah, I don't know.
I mean, we all have SMT.
We can look at the data like, you know,
I don't see what, what they think they're seeing.
Um, I think I love,
they keep using that clip of me and SVG at,
at circuit of the Americas because like, yes,
we're both driving the exact same corner,
but we had two completely different approaches to the corner.
He was, he was trying to get in the corner and I was not worried
about getting in the corner.
I was trying to just get off the corner.
So of course it's going to look as ridiculous as it did,
but again, this is what happens when you have tires that wear out
and you don't have a lot of downforce and you have the added horsepower.
Like, you know, instead of carrying the momentum,
sometimes it's better to, to get things stopped and get off the corner
as fast as you can.
And so, um, yeah, whatever.
It is what it is.
They're not going to listen to me anyway.
So I, there's no point in even trying to convince them.
Um, I was honestly thinking of ways that I can almost poke fun back
at them and, and just egg them on,
egg their conspiracy theories on a little bit,
but I don't really have anything.
No, I know your social team.
Someone said something about the bigger battery having more power
and more power to the car.
That one made me laugh.
That one gave me a really good chuckle too.
A place like Darlington.
Oh my God.
Horsepower at Darlington.
You kidding me?
Yeah.
You want every last bit of it.
We're like wide open around there, right?
Like, oh my gosh.
If I have five more horsepower than the next guy,
I'm going to lap the field.
I love it, man.
I love the conversation.
You got everybody buzzing.
You got the whole sports world buzzing with what you guys have been doing.
Obviously with, with MJ at the racetrack every week.
I mean, he kind of came out of nowhere this week.
I don't think anyone really knew he was in Darlington.
Yeah.
I mean, I was, I was, I, I mean, I'm cool with it.
I get out of the car.
I look behind me.
I'm like, oh, hey, there he is.
There's a bus man.
He's here.
So, um, yeah.
He, um, he was able to come to Phoenix and I didn't win.
And he, he took, he took a week off and we didn't win again.
And then he came back and we won again.
So yeah, we're, we're four for five with MJ tracks.
So yeah.
And I don't know if you go to Martin's or not.
I got to figure that out.
So maybe, maybe he wants to see something special out of practice first.
Who knows.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I want to ask you about kind of your guys's approach.
Billy Scott has the boys, uh, tuned up.
I feel like tell me if this is true.
So you talked a little bit about Kota Kota wears out, um,
tires quickly and more horsepower Kota.
We go to Phoenix, kind of a similar situation.
And at Kota, everyone was talking about all your Ford drive.
It seemed like you had a lot of Ford drive again at Darlington with a similar
package.
Is that just coincidental?
Did you guys learn something about Ford drive at Kota?
Or is it just kind of coincidental that your process is that good?
Yeah.
I think it's just our process.
Um, you know, a place like Darlington.
Yeah.
If you can have more four drive the next guy, great.
But I don't think that was, you know,
where we were better.
I think it was just, we were able to manage our tires.
Good.
Um, we did a good job of, of taking advantage of our long run speed and like
kind of baiting other cars.
I mean, I don't even know if you really baited anybody to pit road.
I mean, they just, when we would catch them, they're just like,
well, we better pit and just try and get back ahead of him further out front.
So, um, yeah, I think those two races in particular,
we just really nailed the handling of our race car.
And, you know, it allowed me to do my job inside the race car like it,
like a Kota and that's hit my marks every lap,
not make a mistake to open the opportunity for, you know,
Blaney to get by early in the race or Shane to get by at the end.
So then at Darlington, you know, it was a bit different.
I wasn't really ever at any point pressured from behind, you know,
so I was always the guy having to come from further back and apply
the pressure to those ahead.
So I'd say those two, it's just like, I mean,
we just really nailed the bounce of our race car.
And truly we did the same thing in Atlanta.
I mean, our car drove really good, um, up until the crash.
And then, I mean, thankfully, you know, we got that quick caution.
I drove way over my head.
Damned erected.
And we got that caution.
I told Billy, I'm like, all right, this is what I need.
I'm like way too loose.
You know, let's try some stuff.
And yeah, we tighten that thing up.
It's, it's hard to nail it, right?
But with the, with a crash car,
we nailed the, the balance adjustment necessary to make the
thing not want to spin out all by itself.
And yeah, we're able to go back up there.
So I don't know.
I mean, I feel like we can keep doing this, you know,
we're going to be competitive, you know, for us, Vegas and Phoenix,
you know, we, we, we did miss it, but it was nice that with missing
it, we were still kind of able to stay around the top 10.
Um, Vegas, I think we, we had a, I mean, Vegas, if, if, you know,
I don't cord the tire at the end, we, we could have been 10th or 11th,
maybe, maybe inside the top 10.
So when we miss it, if our floor can continue to be around 10th,
um, and if we nail it, our ceiling be winning, we're going to have a really good year.
Yeah, for sure.
It's been a really great year for that 45 groups so far.
So we're looking at Martinsville.
Uh, it's been a little bit of the Achilles heel for your group is the short
tracks.
So I'm going to tell you this time, I'm going to make a deal with you.
You guys pull it off at Martinsville.
I will shave a 45 into my hair.
Sounds good.
I already said, if I went in Martinsville, the world's going to end the next
day.
It might just be over.
I can put it in Martinsville.
Everyone else just might as well load up and go home.
If I can figure out Martinsville, they're in trouble.
Um, but I mean, all joking aside though, you know, whether it was my truck
days, um, or, or, or, you know, my time in the cup car, more specifically the
gen six era, when we got the downforce back off the car and we put horsepower
back in, Martinsville just started to make more sense.
And we went back to the next gen car, we went to the next gen car, you know, we
had less power, we had way more grip, way more downforce and Martinsville
started to not make sense again.
So, um, I think for me at a place like that, I only really start to thrive
there when it really wears out.
And so, um, I've just got to figure out how to understand what my car is doing
while it's good so that, you know, we, we get a balance that, that's close to
what I need on the longer runs, when the tires do go away, you know, a guy
that's been able to nail it and manage it so well, well, too, but, but
obviously to come to mind, but, but one has been damn near perfect.
And that's Blaney, um, what he's able to do on the short run to maintain his
track position and then just take off, um, on the long run is impressive.
And so like for me, while that is a competitor, you could look at his
man, that's disheartening.
I mean, he's just so good on the long run.
It's like, well, okay, my strength's a long run too.
So how can I figure out how to kind of patch it up on the short run and
maintain or qualify decent?
So I'm not having to come from the back.
Uh, well, actually, I guess he's made that work too.
So, you know, maybe, maybe it'll work out that way, but, you know, him
between how he drives his race car and then my, you know, my naturally close
relationship with, with Denny and how good he is there.
I'm doing a disservice, but not mentioning Bubba.
Obviously Bubba is amazing there too.
So I've got some really good people that I can lean on and I've been doing
that over the years to try and close that gap, but to come back to the,
to the start of it, I think having the extra power in Martinsville is just
going to make all that more challenging and it's just going to help my
strengths and hopefully get rid of some of my weaknesses at that race track.
Well, we're looking forward to seeing you back behind the wheel that 45
Camry this weekend in Martinsville.
Good luck, brother.
Go after a clock.
I mean, you're, you might as well just keep winning.
You've already gone this far.
You might as well just keep it going.
I'm telling you if I can win a Martinsville.
Oh boy.
Big party.
I'll be there.
I'm in trouble.
I, I, I seriously, I know I'm joking, but like if I can win a Martinsville,
it's, I don't know what to say.
Yeah.
But again, it comes back to the brakes.
If, if we can keep our brakes on a race car and not have breaking issues,
I think we're going to continue to, you know, the speed we're able to bring
to Richmond.
I don't know.
There's no reason we can't take it to Martinsville.
There's no reason we can't take it to Loudon and Iowa and some of these
other race tracks.
And we've shown moments of that.
And so for us, we can just clean it up and make the car,
make the brakes on the car a little bit more reliable and consistent.
I think it's going to very quickly even, even it out and it's going to look
like the other track types.
For sure.
Thanks for joining us.
You got it.
Thanks guys.
On ESPN and on the ESPN app.
About this episode
Tyler Reddick talks through his hot streak after winning at Darlington, including how confidence returned after a win drought and why the Cup season feels different now that he’s a dad. He addresses social-media conspiracy chatter about his No. 45’s speed, laughs at claims about batteries and “extra power,” and explains racecraft: tire management, long-run handling, and how Darlington’s pressure dynamics changed his approach. He also previews Martinsville, joking about shaving his hair if they win, and argues brake reliability and setup balance could turn his short-track weakness into a strength.
Tyler Reddick breaks down his dominant start to the NASCAR Cup Series season with four wins in the first six races, the success of Michael Jordan’s 23XI Racing, and the fan reaction surrounding one of the hottest streaks in recent NASCAR history. In this episode of Victory Lap on Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour, Mamba Smith sits down with Reddick to discuss what it has been like during this incredible run, why the team has been so successful, what it’s like having Michael Jordan at the track, how he responds to criticism and speculation from fans, his relationship with team owner Denny Hamlin, and how he is approaching the upcoming race at Martinsville as the team looks to stay hot.
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