Ep. 57 - Reddick's Rally at Darlington (NASCAR) + Capps' Comeback in Phoenix (NHRA)

About the Podcast: The Throttle to the Floor Podcast is a motorsports podcast where me (William Earnest) and Evan Sager co-host and sit down with guests each week to talk about what is happening in the world of NASCAR, IndyCar, and NHRA plus we take frequent looks at other racing under the motorsports umbrella.

About the Episode: On this episode of the Throttle to the Floor Podcast, I recap NASCAR action from Darlington including Tyler Reddick's comeback from a bad alternator and cool suit; plus I cover NHRA’s scorching hot trip to the desert in Phoenix where Ron Capps came back from a round two engine failure to score the Funny Car victory.

Transcript

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Hey y'all, welcome to today's episode of the Carl Floor Podcast. I'm your host, Will Ernest, here today, and we got a scorcher of an episode tonight. But first, with some uh other news real quick. First, uh Denny Hamlin, he was made available to the media on Saturday prior to the NASCAR Cup Series race from Darlington Raceway, and he said that he has uh no plans to continue racing in the at least in the Cup Series uh after 2027, which is when his uh current contract is set to expire. Hamlin also said on his podcast, Action's Detrimental, that he would like to end off his career with 67 career wins. He's currently at 61 after his win at Las Vegas. I don't know if he's gonna get to that many career wins, but just logically, this seems like a good time for Hamlin. He's currently the oldest active full-time driver in the cup series at 45 years old, and his co-owned team, uh 2311 Racing, has now won four of the first six races of the cup series season with Tyler Reddick, which we'll discuss uh more about Reddick later. And uh also, real quick, the 12 hours of Cring Endurance race for uh Imsa, it was this past weekend Porsche Pen Porsche Pensky Motorsport not only secured the uh overall win following their Rolex 24 victory back in January, but they also secured a uh one-two finish. So uh good for them. But we're gonna jump in here. First up, we got uh Annie Trey from Phoenix and just the the triple digit the triple-digit temperatures were the big storyline this weekend in Phoenix. His start times all weekend were moved up, but despite that grip and traction, uh was still name of the game in pro stock. We had some big upsets, including uh Matt Latino, who upset uh Gainesville winner Matt Hartford in round one thanks to uh 017 Light, and Chris McGehee upset number one qualifier and defending Phoenix winner Greg Anderson in round one on a whole shot by eight ten thousandths of a second, but then in round two just gets absolutely left in the dust on the starting line, but still uh great win for that small team, but just you know, thanks to those mistakes and uh it was defending pro stock world champion Dallas Glenn who took advantage and was able to capitalize as he looks to go uh back to back um as world champion, but he wins the pro stock final over Cody Coughlin for his first win of the year, first win in Arizona, and uh that's after he finished runner-up the past two years uh here, and it's his 22nd career pro stock victory. So Dallas Glinton already, you know, two races into the season, he's already looking to be on his way to win another pro stock world championship. But getting into top field, Doug Coletta got the mission to mission foods too fast to taste the challenge victory on Saturday before almost being upset in round one by Will Smith on Sunday, and then Tony Schumacher beat teammate uh Rick Ray Racing teammate Clay Milliken at a pedal fest for his 900th career round one or round victory before uh Schumacher blew the supercharger off the dragster right up clean right off in his uh round two loss to uh eventual winner Sean Langdon. We'll talk more about it about him in a few minutes. Um gains of winner, Josh Hart lost in round two to Leah Pruitt after uh he smoked the tires down track. But just I wanna I want to talk about Maddie Gordon for a minute as um you know Maddie the batty, if you will. Um but Maddie Gordon makes her second straight semifinal appearance in just her second top field start after beating Tony Stewart in round two a day after almost qualifying number one, um, but ended up being the number four qualifier. Um, but just the momentum and the buzz that she's had around her rookie season and the momentum that Ron Caps Motorsports has had as a team, uh in general, more on team owner Ron Caps in in a few minutes, just but just all that momentum just can't be ignored. I mean, she's handled the pressure so well and has just been able to understand what the car is doing underneath her and just I'm gonna go out on a limb. Okay, I'm gonna go I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that when the winner nationals happens in a few weeks, Maddie Gordon is gonna make the final round. Actually, you know what? She don't she might just win the whole thing. I mean, just just to be honest, I mean, just the amount of momentum and just passion and drive that she has. She might just go out and win the whole thing. So yeah, bookmark it. Maddie Gordon is gonna win the 2026 NHR Lucas Oil Winner Nationals. Um, so yeah, um, we'll see in three weeks if we find out if I was right or if I was dead wrong. Yeah, I mean, probably I'll I'll probably be dead wrong if we're being honest. But that's just that's just my bold prediction, if you will. Um, but back to Phoenix. Leah Pruitt and just her second start back in top field wins by 1910,000ths of a second over Doug Coletta to advance to the final round. However, it's Sean Langdon, who we mentioned earlier, uh, who beats Leah Pruitt to win the top field final for his first win of the year, his third straight in Arizona, and his 23rd career win, and Langdon is the first top field driver ever to win this event here here in Phoenix in in Arizona in three consecutive years, which is just insane. I mean, not that many times have you seen a driver win, you know, three consecutive years at any track. I mean, so you know, Sean Langdon just able to battle through the heat and the tough conditions all week to get his third straight win in Phoenix. But um the the big storyline at any tray, uh class-wise, was definitely funny car. Um J.R. Todd beat Jordan Vanegrift in the Funny Car Mission Foods Too Fast Too Tasty Challenge after Vandegrift beat Chad Green in the semis, thanks to Green going way red. I mean, that was over like a tenth of a second. I don't know if something was wrong, if he double-stepped it or what, but just got it got his timing screwed up or something, but yeah. And then in eliminations, Jack Beckman's rough start continues as despite being the number two qualifier. He was upset in round one by Dan Wilkerson, and then uh Vancroff beats another John Force racing teammate in round one this week. It's Alexis de Joria after uh she double steps and goes red. Um Austin Proc, after D ⁇ Qing for the first time in his career two weeks ago in Gainesville, he lost in a uh round one uh tire smoking fest against uh J.R. Todd. So I mean Vandegrift and Vandegrift and Proc's old Cornwall Tools ride, if you will, he's two, two and oh and proc who's now at Tasca racing this year, zero. So if we had to say who's uh the who's got the early leg up uh in the I mean it's not really a trade, but who's got the early leg up between the whole, you know, Proc leaving John Force Racing to go to Tasca. Uh it's definitely John Forrest racing with Jordan Vandegriff. So um yeah, um defending Phoenix winner Paul Lee advanced to the semifinals after uh Gator Nationals winner Chad Green hit Tyre Smoke immediately. Uh Matt Hagen took down Jordan Vandegriff to advance to the semis after they both lost power and coast. It was kind of a weird deal, but just um, yeah, but Jordan Vandegriff, uh his second start in a funny car, um, you know, wins another round, goes the second round. Uh pretty productive day for him. Um, but just the just the big the man the man of the hour. Um we we kind of hinted at it earlier. Um just Ron Caps, man. What a day was it for him and just all of Ron Caps motorsports is Ron Caps another big time engine explosion at Phoenix the second year in a row, but this time he wins his round two matchup over Dan Wilkerson, and then the team is able to scramble to put the car back together. Caps barely made the call uh to the lanes for his semifinal matchup, but it doesn't matter he won that semifinal matchup over defending Phoenix winner Paul Lee, and then Caps beats number one qualifier Spencer Hyde, slams the door shut to win the funny car final after uh again he blew his engine up in round two, and they're able to completely rebuild the car and still go on to win this race. So just just insanity. I mean, you don't hear about that in other motorsports, but it's Cap's first win since Bristol last June, his fourth win in Arizona, and his 78th overall career victory. So yeah, uh NHRA will return April 9th through the 12th for the NHRA Lucas Oil Internationals, um, and the winner in Funny Car will be the winner of the 1000th funny car race all time and will receive a special unique trophy in addition to the 75th anniversary diamond walleye. So funny cars got extra motivation on the line um when we get to Pomona, California, but we'll see. But from one hot historic weekend we go to another as NASCAR this past weekend was at the Lady in Black, the track too tough to tame. Uh Darlington Raceway with all three top series in action. We start with trucks. I mean, just I want I want to start with just Ben Rhodes. Such a tough deal, tough DNF for uh uh my girlfriend Haley. Flat tire into the wall in lap two. Just uh Ben Rhodes' night ended before it began, pretty much. Um but then uh Christian Eckis won stage one and uh Caden Honeycutt, man, just it looked like Honeycutt was gonna win this race as he ran up front for much of this race, one stage two, but then he was starting to slip back late before uh a lay race caution. Hubsavar broke something, it was like a shock or a shock mount or something, but he got into the wall and spun out from the lead as uh Ross Chastain was right behind him, but um yeah, but that set up overtime. In overtime, there was a wreck in one and two after Tyler Ankram got up into the wall. Uh it looked like a bunch of trucks piled up behind him, but not not really. I mean it it looked a lot worse than it did. Um yeah, and then in double overtime, it looked like Ross Chastain was gonna score the truck series win. But Corey Haim, who this week was in the uh in the uh number five tricon garage truck, not the one truck, the five truck this time. Uh, but he goes from ninth to first in just two laps on that last restart uh with uh fresher uh scuffed tires to score the victory. Just uh just to such a clean slide job in three and four by Heim to get the victory. It's Corey Heim's second straight win at Darlington after he won there last fall and his 24th career truck series win. And Haim also secured$50,000 for winning the first race of the triple truck challenge. Our point standing Stacy leads Bernardo by 27, Evan by 95, Noah by 116, me by 163, and Haley by 165. Our picks. I picked Grant Angfinger. He had like a 12th to 15th place truck all night, but with the double overtime, like a little bit of chaos, like just a little bit of chaos. Um he was able to get up there and finish seventh, so so we stopped, we stopped the bleeding. Um I'm still very far back in the truck series point standings, but we managed to stop the bleeding. Um yeah, Evan picked Caden Honeycutt, finished fourth, led 59 laps from the pole, which was the most laps led. Just what could have been for Caden Honeycutt? I mean, the this was this was the first um outing that I can say that Caden Honeycut in that 11 truck uh should have won this race or you know had a chance to win this race. And ironically, it was Corey Haim who won this race, just not in the 11 truck. Um yeah, Haley, as we mentioned, picked Ben Rhodes, finished last in 36th, DNF'd after uh that lap two wall contact. Stacy picked Chandler Smith, who only could finish uh 17th. Uh Noah picked Justin Haley, who quiet day in 15th, and Bernardo was the big winner with Corey Heim, led 28 laps to the victory. That's why he was able to cut a lot of that points gap, only 27 back now. Stacy. Um but yeah, getting into O'Reilly's now. Uh I mean in the truck series we had Caden Honeycutt who looked like he was gonna win after he led much of the race. And O'Reilly's it was Kyle Larson. As Larson, he was filling in for Alex Bowman. He was who was scheduled to run the 88 JRM car, but of course, with his uh vertigo symptoms, uh he was not able to drive, so Larson jumped in for him, uh, took off from the pole with the lead and dominated to sweep the stages one, both stage one and stage two. Um tough day for RCR. Austin Hill with early issues after getting into the wall, and then he got caught up in a later wreck. Um, but he ends up not being able to recover. Finished this race in 35th, five laps down when it was all said and done. So not a good day for Austin Hill. And Jesse Love uh got spun around on Pit Road and started stage two in the rear. I believe he still finished like 11th, but just not a good day for RCR in general. Um also Ross Chastain got spun around on pit road later in the race. He never really had much of a contending car and came home in 14th place in the O'Reilly series, unlike the truck race the prior night where he was he was a couple corners away from winning the truck race until Corey Haim came out of nowhere. Um yeah, Brandon Jones then took the lead to start stage three, but Justin Allgayer, just those last two restarts, he was able to just drive by Brandon Jones, drive by on the outside and take the lead. Um, but Larson took the lead back with 33 to go, and then that late records we mentioned with Austin Hill and uh with also with Kyle C. Um, everybody took tires with like 20 to go. Brandon Jones again won the race off Pit Road, but then Algayer took the lead back on the outside, um, held off Brandon Jones. Larson wasn't able to catch up either. Um so Justin Algayer ends up winning this race. It's Algar's second win of the year after Phoenix a couple weeks ago. His fourth win at Darlington, his 30th career O'Reilly series win, and Algar is the fifth driver to win at least four races at Darlington. Um big shakeup in the O'Reilly series standings. I'm now the points leader in O'Reilly's um by 15 over Stacy, 46 over Bernardo, 83 over Haley, 126 over Evan, and 140 over Noah are picks. Um a big reason why I took that points lead was I picked Brandon Jones, who finished second after leading nine laps. There were only four leaders in this entire race, and uh I was one of them. And as you'll see, Haley was another. Um, but we'll get to her in a minute. Uh Evan picked Sam Mayer, who finished uh in 10th, just kind of a quiet day. Um, I mean, honestly, just Haas Factory team in general had kind of a quiet day, although Creed definitely made a lot more ground up. Um, but yeah, just Mayer just was a quiet day, you know. A lot better than Las Vegas, where despite finishing second in stage one, he had that power and fuel pickup issue. So yeah, Mayer definitely uh will gladly take a tenth over uh 30 30 something place finish. So yeah, um Haley's mention uh was able to lead some laps, led 31 laps with Justin Olgayer. That's right, Haley won this race and got the fastest laps. So Haley is the big winner, um, makes up a ton of ground in the point standings um after a tough handful of races to start the year. Uh Stacy, the big reason why she slipped out of the points lead is because she picked Jesse Love, who finished 11th, and Bernardo lost a lot of ground too. He unfortunately picked Austin Hill, who finished back in 35th, and Noel with Harrison Burton just a quiet 22nd. It looked like Harrison Burton uh had an alright car. I mean he qualified uh not too bad, just didn't really go anywhere. Um, so yeah, that that's O Rileys for you. Um, but getting into the big show uh for Cup, there's been a lot of split opinions on uh the new package this past weekend, a lot of people complaining, and it's like, you know, I don't I don't really think the race was all that bad. I mean say what you will about the package, but I mean, you know, people who said that that race was boring, you know, like you expect wreck fest, you you expect half the field to get wrecked, like it's towel they get every single weekend. Like, you know, sometimes you just have just you know good, clean, hard racing. I mean, we we saw it um a lot, but I wanna I want to give a shout out to Daryl Waltrup. He went up to the booth and he really said his trademark, boogity boogity boogie, let's go racing, boys. Said that phrase again to get us going for the first time since his last race um as a full-time broadcaster, which of course real ball knowers know, was Sonoma 2019 when uh MTJ scored the victory. I remember that very well. Um yeah, just just great to hear from Daryl Waltrip. Um and not only was it great to hear, it sat it sounded like prime Daryl Waltrip from like early 2000s, so that was great. Um, but Tyler Reddick, he took off and uh led from the pole, which backed up his blistering fast qualifying lap from um back on Saturday, until he had a bad alternator which required a battery replacement, and then he had a terrible pit stop from the lead. So yeah, some some tough early race issues for Redick, and that's not the only issues he'd have from this race. Brad Geslowski inherited the lead after pit stops. He goes on to win stage one, and then uh some more pit road issues. Uh Blaney had a loose lug nut on pit road, and Bubba Wallace had trouble on the left front of the car. Um Larson won the race off pit road. Then early in stage two, Eric Jones spun in three and four off the front of Denny Hamlin. Bubba got into the wall too. That that kind of ended Bubba's day after starting on the front row alongside teammate Tyler Reddick. Just Bubba did not have a great day after that. Uh Chris Busher tried to run down teammate Brad Kozlowski. RFK in general was just really good uh in this race. But Kozlowski goes on to sweep the stages. He also won uh stage two, and then at the start of stage three, Chase Briscoe passed Kozlowski for the lead before Riley Herb spun on the front stretch with with for what would become the final caution of the race. There was only four cautions this entire race, two of them for the stage breaks, and then Jones' spin and herbs' spin. So uh pretty clean race, but that doesn't mean that they weren't racing hard. They were racing pretty hard. But um, as if Reddick didn't have enough problems late in the race, he started to have cool suit issues. That's right. Another cool suit failure. We're we're talking about this again. We talked about it at the end of uh uh when we were recapping the uh Coda race. So I mean we're just we're just dealing with these same issues again. It's like what are they making these cool suits out of or something? Um yeah, but it's it still looked like Brack Kazowski was gonna snap his almost two-year-long winless streak with another win at Darlington as he snapped a uh almost three-year winless streak with his most recent one, which was Darlington in the spring race in 2024. Um, so he was looking to win again at Darlington to snap an almost two-year long winless streak. But Tyler Reddick had fresh tires and was able to run down Brad Gaslowski despite the alternator issue, replacing the battery, um, the bad pit stop, and just the the cool suit failure, all of that. He was able to run down Brad Gaslowski, took the lead with under 30 to go. Um, and just also shout out to Carson Hosovar. He had a uh fast car. In practice, but despite picking up damage and qualifying, I mean, which it which caused them to start last in 36, they you know got repairs done and whatnot, and yet they drove all the way up from dead last all the way back in the trunk uh to fourth place in the finish. So great run for Carson Hosevar in that 1981 uh Dalen Hart senior Wrangler scheme. So yeah, great scheme, great finish for Hosevar. Um and then also uh just despite Larson having a broken toe link plus Briscoe and Herbs getting into the wall late, NASCAR chose to not throw the caution. I don't know if it warranted a caution. I think like they did they did tell Larson that he needed to speed up to make minimum speed, but I don't know. I Larson Larson was rolling around pretty slow for a long time. So like I don't know, and he kept missing pit roads. So debatable on whether that was a caution or not, at least from my point of view, but I I I think I I I don't think it caused too much of an issue um with Nazger keeping it green, they kept it green. So yeah, so it ends up being Tyler Reddick, who comes back from a bad alternating, you know, replacement battery, broken cool suit, terrible pit stop while leading. And yet he wins his first race at Darlington, his fourth win of the year through just the first six races and his twelfth career win. Redick now becomes just the third driver ever to win four of the first six races in a year after Dalen Hart Sr. in 1987 and Bill Elliott in 1992. And Toyota's now won five of the first six races to start the year, Reddick with four of them, and then uh ironically, uh, you know, the other 23-11 co-owner besides Michael Jordan, uh Denny Hamlin, he won it Las Vegas, you know, for Joker's racing. But Toyota with five of the first uh six race six races with a win. Uh it's the first time that that's happened in Cup since Chevy did it back in 2007. That was before I was alive. So it's been quite a long time, almost 20 years at this point. But uh standings after Darlington, uh Stacy leads, Bernardo by 37, me by 39, Haley by 93, Noah by 115, and Evan by 143 are picks. Uh I picked William Byron. He did not have a dominant start, or he did not have a dominant race like he did at Darlington last year, but just kind of just a quiet run. I mean, he ran like 6th to 12th all day, finished eighth. It's about all I could ask for uh out of him. I haven't had a tough day with uh Christopher Bell finishing 19th, just JGR in general, like they all ran like 15th to 20th basically all day. But like, you know, Briscoe showed speed late, Ty Gibbs showed speed late, um Hamlin was just kind of eh, especially after uh contact and spinning Eric Jones, but just Bell just went nowhere. Um and speaking of Briscoe, despite that late wall contact, which uh cost Briscoe probably a top five. Uh Briscoe ends up finishing 12th. That was uh Haley's pick, led four laps. Um Stacy uh picked Blaney, who finished third. Big reason why she kept the points lead. Blaney somehow came back to finish third after that loose lug nut. Um he had a loose lug nut and then he went to uh a different pit stall to make sure to tighten it. So good heads up to where uh Blaney didn't end up losing the wheel because that would have been really bad. Um Bernardo picked Brad Keslowski, finished second, let 142 laps, which was the most laps. It looked like Brad Keslowski was going to win this race, and I will say I think Brad Keslowski had the fastest car during this race. It's just when it came time for crunch time, Reddick and Fresh Tires, and that's yeah. That's all she wrote. So, um, and Noah picked Ty Gibbs, who finished sixth, led a lap. Just I'm in I'm impressed with Ty Gibbs. He came into this race with three straight top fives. We all kind of have doubted him just because he's Ty Gibbs, but still came home in sixth. So I mean, just it's tough. Is Ty Gibbs closer to a win than Carson Hosevar? It it it's tough. I mean, Ty Gibbs has been running good, and usually when you run when you run good like this, you know, you know, Ty Gibbs had three straight top fives, and now, you know, he and then he comes to Darlington and finishes sixth. Usually when you're running good, you know, you're gonna get a chance and be in contention to win races. But at the same time, hopes of our has been in contention to win races too. He led on the last lap of the Jonah 500 before getting wrecked. He finished uh fourth at Atlanta back in February, um, which makes it feel like it was a while ago, but not really, it was only about a month ago. But he finished fourth at Atlanta and he finished fourth at Darlington. So, you know, Hosevar has been up there too, but if I had to say, I'm I'm just gonna say this. I feel like Gibbs is like a half a step ahead of Hosevar right now in terms of like who do I think is slightly who do I think s has a slightly better chance to get their first career win, but it is close. I mean you could practically flip a coin um at this rate. I you know, I mean I wouldn't be surprised if both of them get their first career wins this year, but uh we'll see. But we've got NASCAR uh cup and O'Reilly's heading to the paperclip uh at Martinsville for the first time this year. Trucks are off once again, um, as well as IndyCar um after their one-off week to start the year. Uh they're heading down to Barber Motorsports Park for a road course showdown in Alabama this weekend, and that preview and all that, that'll be coming to you Friday. But that's all we got for today's episode of the Throttle Four Podcast. Make sure you tune in and listen and watch and download on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, uh, wherever you get your podcasts, uh, check out the chill photography and throttle for podcasts, Instagrams, and TikTok accounts. And uh yeah, that's all we got for uh this week's episode, or sorry, today's episode of the Throttlefort Podcast. Um, I it's still ingrained in my brain to say that.