LOUDON, N.H. — Tyler Reddick conceded he was a bit surprised — although pleasantly so — at his Busch Light Pole Qualifying effort Saturday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway after the five-time race winner and 2026 championship contender claimed the top starting position for Sunday’s Dollar Tree 301 (2 p.m. ET on USA Network, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) NASCAR Cup Series race.
Reddick turned a lap of 131.094 mph around the historic New England mile track in his No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota, besting Wood Brothers Racing’s Josh Berry by .015 seconds in the No. 21 Ford. It’s Reddick’s fourth pole position of the season and 15th of his career.
Including weather-forced qualifying cancellations, it’s the seventh time Reddick has started from the top position on the grid this year — the first time since Charlotte in May that he will start from the number one position.
Four times the 30-year-old Californian has won from that place on the starting grid — leading the field to both the green flag and the checkered at back-to-back races at Echo Park Speedway near Atlanta and the Circuit of The Americas road course this spring and then again three weeks later at the historic Darlington Raceway and most recently at Kansas Speedway in May, where he claimed his fifth — and most recent — victory.
Saturday’s pole-winning work came after a frustrating 31st-place effort for single-lap speed in the 50-minute practice session; Reddick’s Toyota was only 26th-best in 10-lap average speed. This will be the first front-row start for him since June at Nashville when he qualified second.
“I was thinking if qualifying went good, we’d be top 10,” Reddick conceded. “Obviously, you want to get the most out of the car, the most out of the lap. I just tried to understand what I didn’t like about my car in practice and make sure not to tap into that at all on the lap. Just try to make the most of our strengths in practice and tie it all together and run a really good lap in qualifying.
“Just feel like my mindset was in a really good place for what I needed to do,” added Reddick, who has now started top 10 in 17 of the 25 races.
It was a strong showing for Berry as well, who has now rolled off in the top 10 in all three of his career New Hampshire starts. Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron was third-quickest in the No. 24 Chevrolet, with championship points leader Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin fourth on the grid.
Trackhouse Racing’s Shane Van Gisbergen turned in a clutch qualifying effort and will start fifth in the No. 97 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet, calling his car “great” after the session and emphasizing how important he expects track position to be. Especially so, considering he is ranked 16th and holds a 50-point advantage on that final Chase qualifying position. It’s the fifth time this season the New Zealander road racing champion has started from the top 10 on an oval course.
Two-time New Hampshire winner Christopher Bell was sixth-fastest in the qualifying session, just ahead of his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Ty Gibbs in seventh. Defending race winner Ryan Blaney will roll off eighth in the No. 12 Ford with Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson and Alex Bowman rounding out the top 10.
“Tells me if we hit it, we should be pretty good on speed but that’s going to be the tough part, right, making sure we make the right changes between today and tomorrow,” said Reddick, who flashed a big smile after his effort. “Going to some of these tracks, on more typical days when I’ve been sitting on pole, we’ve been fast in practice. This one is really fun and cool because practice was not like for us.
“It wasn’t like we walked away from practice thinking we need to make a little adjustment here or there, so for us to take that and go lay the lap down like we did, that for me is a big deal.
“For me, I’ve been able to get the pole at a few of places over the years that’s been really fun and special but the fashion we did it today was really, really awesome.”
–Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service. Special to Field Level Media
