NASCAR: Tyler Reddick wins regular season title, but his team doesn't

In Sunday night's Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway, 23XI Racing's Tyler Reddick held on to his points lead and won the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series regular season championship by just a single point (860 to 859) over Hendrick Motorsports' Kyle Larson.

The one-point gap means that had Larson simply started the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway back in May, he would have been the regular season champion. He owns the tiebreaker over Reddick due to having four regular season wins; Reddick has two.

Larson opted to remain at Indianapolis Motor Speedway and compete in the 108th running of the Indy 500 after a lengthy rain delay, ensuring he would not be able to start the Coca-Cola 600. He arrived at Charlotte with plenty of laps remaining, but rain there caused the race to be stopped early, and he did not get to compete.

Even if he had taken over for his replacement, Justin Allgaier, during the rain delay, he would not have been eligible to score points since Allgaier started the race.

As a result, Reddick still would have won the regular season championship by a single point.

However, Allgaier still scored points for Larson's No. 5 team in the owner standings in that race, despite the fact that he is a full-time Xfinity Series driver and is therefore not eligible for Cup Series points himself.

Allgaier finished that race in 13th place and thus scored 24 points for the No. 5 team. So the No. 5 team actually beat Reddick's No. 45 team for the regular season owner championship by 23 points (883 to 860), thus scoring an extra 15 playoff points. The No. 45 team scored an extra 10.

On the driver side, Reddick scored an extra 15 playoff points thanks to his regular season, while Larson scored an extra 10 thanks to his runner-up result.

That five-point gap is the equivalent of a full race win, so a 10-point swing is the equivalent of two victories.

Larson won four races and 10 stages, netting him 30 playoff points, so he is set to start the playoffs atop the standings with 40. Reddick won two races and three stages, netting him 13, so he is set to start the playoffs in third place with 28.

But the No. 5 team is set to start with 45 playoff points on the owner side, while the No. 45 team is set to start with 23. Like Larson himself, the No. 5 team is the leader, and like Reddick, the No. 45 team is still in third place, despite not having as many playoff points.

The 2024 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs are scheduled to get underway this Sunday, September 8 with the Quaker State 400 presented by Walmart, which is set to be broadcast live on USA Network from Atlanta Motor Speedway beginning at 3:00 p.m. ET. Begin a free trial of FuboTV now and don't miss any of the action!