AUSTIN, Texas — Before last Sunday, five drivers had won the first two races of a season at NASCAR’s highest level. None of the five succeeded in winning a third straight race.
Minus a right-front fender, Daytona 500 champion Tyler Reddick drove his No. 45 Toyota to victory at EchoPark Speedway on that Sunday to become the sixth driver to win the first two races of a given season.
It would be foolish not to recognize that Reddick has a realistic chance to claim a record third straight win to start the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season—even with road course mavens Shane van Gisbergen and Connor Zilisch in the field for Sunday’s DuraMAX Texas Grand Prix Powered by RelaDyne at Circuit of The Americas.
Several of his predecessors have come close. Marvin Panch, who won the first two races of the 1957 season—albeit in late 1956—finished third at Titusville in the following race.
In the 1959 season, Bob Welborn won at Fayetteville, N.C., and earned the pole position for the Daytona 500 by winning the first of two qualifying races.
But Welborn’s hopes for a third straight win died when his engine failed in the Great American Race. He finished 41st.
Driving the famed Wood Brothers Purolator Mercury in 1976, David Pearson won the road race at Riverside, Calif., and the Daytona 500 in a ferocious battle against Richard Petty. His bid for three straight ended with an oil pump failure at Rockingham.
In 1997, Jeff Gordon opened the season with victories at Daytona and Rockingham and led the first 65 laps at Richmond before finishing fourth, one lap down, in a race won by Rusty Wallace.
Matt Kenseth, the most recent driver to open a season with two wins, took checkered flags at Daytona and Fontana, Calif., in 2009, only to have his engine expire six laps into the following race at Las Vegas.
It’s serendipitous for Reddick that the third race of the season takes place at 2.4-mile COTA. The track is Reddick’s best in terms of average finish (4.6). That average finish number also is foremost among active Cup drivers.
Only once in five starts at the track has Reddick started or finished outside the top five. That was in 2021 when he ran ninth in his maiden voyage at COTA. Reddick has two poles to his credit at the track (2021 and 2025) and one victory (2023).
Reddick is well aware of the possible record, but that won’t be his only consideration on Sunday.
“I mean, am I going to throw away a second place to do that?” asked the 23XI driver, who leads the series standings by 40 points over second-place Bubba Wallace, his teammate. “Probably not. But certainly, if at any point during this week I’m running out of reasons to be motivated to go win, I’ll keep that in my back pocket, for sure.
“It’s cool to be able… or have the opportunity to potentially do things like that, but for me, with where this season started and what I need to do as a driver, it’s all about just doing everything I can and showing up every week being as prepared as I can.
“So, yeah, I’ll try and make that a reality.”
Standing in Reddick’s way is New Zealander Shane van Gisbergen, who won five of the six road course races on last year’s Cup schedule. With the number of road courses reduced to four this year, Van Gisbergen may feel a greater sense of urgency at COTA, where he is winless in two starts.
On the other hand, SVG has shown considerable improvement on oval tracks. He finished sixth last Sunday at EchoPark Speedway in Georgia and is 16th in the Cup Series standings.
“These oval races, we are making big gains, and we weren’t really in position very often to score stage points last year,” said the three-time Australian Supercars champion. “Now we are able to do that in Daytona and Atlanta, and it’s very promising.
“These road courses, we just go and have fun. They are like a holiday for us. We just go and enjoy ourselves and hopefully come away with a lot of points and a great result.”
