Denny Hamlin lauds NASCAR star as true ‘character’ – Sports News
23XI Racing co-owner Denny Hamlin revealed that he was “very proud” of Tyler Reddick after he selflessly gave the lead back to his teammate, Corey Heim, during the final phases of the Anduril 250.
With roughly three laps remaining in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at San Diego’s Naval Base Coronado, Heim obtained to the inside and cleanly executed his overtake on Reddick, who slipped exiting Turn 2. The No. 45 Toyota driver tried to retake the lead with a crossover maneuver getting into Turn 5, however doored the No. 67 Toyota and despatched it wider up the observe.
Rather than dashing previous his teammate, Reddick opted to back off — later acknowledging that it was the suitable factor to do. Heim wasted no time seizing the chance, assuming the lead one final time en path to claiming the checkered flag.
Speaking to Steve Taranto, Hamlin counseled Reddick for making issues proper with Heim whereas nonetheless on the observe. “I think it speaks a lot to Tyler’s character, right?” he mentioned.
“I mean, he apparently felt like Corey raced him very clean, got around him clean. And when he tried to pass him back clean, he didn’t, so he wanted to hit the reset button and try it again. I’m very proud of that, because it’s very easy when you’re racing for the win to just say ‘I’ll say I’m sorry later.’ But it speaks a lot to the character of Tyler Reddick.”
Following the race, Reddick conceded that he overdid the transfer whereas trying to go Heim. “This wasn’t a good day. I certainly overdid it and ran him in the wall and initiated contact and everything,” the 30-year-old mentioned.
“So yeah, just not the way to race a teammate. I just apologized. He raced me really clean. He got the lead fair and square. Just overdid it.”
The form gesture was welcomed by Heim, even when Reddick’s transfer caught him off guard within the heat of the second. “I don’t know. I feel like for a while I thought there he was kind of playing with me,” Heim defined on the Amazon Prime post-race show.
“He was able to set the pace being the lead car, but I was kind of able to stick with it. I’m like, ‘I’m not really burning my stuff up.’ So five to go came and it was just kind of time to put some pressure on him, see if I could get him to make a mistake and, sure enough, he did. I guess he ended up braking or something. I don’t know what happened to him.
“But a lot of respect for him, though, he doored me down there in [Turn] 5 I think and gave it back to me. That’s something you don’t see every day. Great teammate. Just crazy. It feels like a dream. I hope I don’t wake up from this dream.”
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