Tyler Reddick stormed to the Busch Light Pole at Circuit of The Americas, clocking 88.094 mph in his No. 45 Toyota to lead a 23XI Racing front-row sweep for Sunday’s EchoPark Automotive Grand Prix (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, PRN, SiriusXM). Teammate Bubba Wallace chased him down in quals, landing second, 0.224 seconds back. It’s Reddick’s second COTA pole, 10th career nod, and fourth on a road course— cementing his knack on the twisties.
“Going into (Turn) 1, I’m like, ‘Dang, I wish that he (Wallace) would have gapped himself a little bit more,’ because I felt like I was messing his lap up, for sure,” Reddick said post-run. “Talking to him after the fact, his focus was to go out and follow me and kind of see what I was going to do and try to mimic it. Certainly, he’s on the path to getting better at the road courses. He’s learning and if he keeps it up here soon, I’ll be having to try to battle him head-to-head for these poles. It’s been really nice to see his growth and him improve and embrace the way we have to do things…”
Chase Elliott nabbed third on his second lap at the revamped 2.4-mile track—shortened this year, stretching the race to 95 laps from 2024’s 68. Carson Hocevar rolled fourth, with Chevy pack Daniel Suárez, Shane van Gisbergen, Kyle Larson, Kyle Busch, and Ross Chastain trailing. Todd Gilliland’s Ford snagged 10th. Rookie Connor Zilisch, set for his Cup debut, qualified 14th.
Practice was all SVG. Trackhouse’s Kiwi topped both sessions—87.401 mph in the first, 87.409 mph in the second—owning the revised layout. William Byron (86.892 mph), Hocevar (86.853 mph), Ryan Blaney (86.801 mph), and Alex Bowman (86.742 mph) chased in Practice 2. Larson (86.701 mph) and AJ Allmendinger (86.684 mph) hit the top five in the opener. Both runs stayed clean—no wrecks, just data.
Reddick, a 2023 COTA winner with a 5.0 average finish there, has 23XI humming. Wallace is closing the gap—Sunday’s the test.