Charlotte, North Carolina (AP) After battling a stomach ailment throughout the Southern 500 to win NASCAR’s regular-season title by one point over Kyle Larson, Tyler Reddick and the 23XI Racing ownership group traveled to receive the trophy.
Reddick stood next to the trophy, with club co-owner Michael Jordan on his side. Denny Hamlin and Curtis Polk, the co-owners, were on the opposite side.
Nowhere to be found? A NASCAR executive will present the hardware. “You know, certainly, pretty disappointed to not see anyone from NASCAR present Tyler his trophy,” he remarked.
Was it personal? He wasn’t sure, but he couldn’t recall any time when a NASCAR executive wasn’t present to hand out gleaming new hardware.
With the 10-race playoffs opening Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway, NASCAR and its teams remain bitterly locked in a years-long feud on an extension of the franchise system at the heart of the business. The teams want a bigger share of the revenue pie, a seat at the negotiating table and for charters — they guarantee a spot in any Cup Series race and thus part of the purse — to become permanent.
Every single proposal made to the teams has been deemed unacceptable. As it happens, Polk — who helped Jordan become one of the most recognizable celebrities in the world — is the unofficial leader of the team resistance with charters set to expire at the end of the year.
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