2026 Straight Talk Wireless 500 (Phoenix) Race Recap

By Adam Carabine

Ryan Blaney overcame the odds to break Tyler Reddick’s winning streak, and wins for the second time in a row at Phoenix Raceway. 

Blaney suffered through much adversity all day long, but clearly had one of the best cars and managed to make his way back to the front to cross the finish line first. 

Lap 1: Logano starts on the pole, with Kyle Larson beside him to start the race. 

Lap 40: A fairly uneventful start to the race, no cautions yet. Interesting to note that tire fall-off has already slowed the cars down about 1.5-2 seconds per lap.

Lap 42: As we’re on #ReddickWatch to see if he can win four in a row, he’s made his way up to 3^rd after starting 8^th.

Lap 47: Logano’s teammate Ryan Blaney takes over the lead.

Lap 58: Christopher Bell starts charging forward and moves to P3.

Lap 59: Logano is fading back, Bell moves to P2 just ahead of the end of the stage.

Lap 60: Ryan Blaney wins a caution-free Stage One! There are 25 cars on the lead lap, and Riley Herbst gets the free pass.

Lap 65: Pits open, Bell wins the race off pit road.  Larson is nabbed for speeding on pit road and will start at the rear.

Lap 71: Stage Two is green with Bell and Logano on the front row.

Lap 93: Kyle Busch tags the wall, though it stays green.  He has a tire down and manages to limp it to pit road.

Lap 94: Just one lap later, though, Shane Van Gisbergen spins on his own right at the start-finish line, CAUTION comes out.

Lap 97: Pits open, Bell just beats Logano to the line to win the race off pit road.  Brad Keselowski gets the free pass.

Lap 98: Ryan Blaney has to come back to pit road a second time to fix a loose wheel.  Bubba Wallace gets a speeding penalty as well, the two of them will start at the back.

Lap 102:  Back to green (get ready because we’ll be saying this a lot coming up)

Lap 103: CAUTION – Big pileup in Turn 2 – Daniel Suarez, Chase Elliott, Ryan Preece, Josh Berry are all involved.  They’ll pit to get fresh tires again (which will come into play later on in the race)

Lap 109: Back to green.

Lap 132: CAUTION is out for Chase Briscoe as he has a tire go down and he slams the outside wall.  He’s out of the race, and now he has finished outside of the Top 35 in three of the four races so far this season.

Lap 134: On pit road, Blaney has another wheel that’s not tight.  They catch it in time, and he stops in his teammate Logano’s pit box to get it tightened.  However, that’s a penalty that will send him to the back of the field a SECOND time.

Lap 140: Back to green.

Lap 158: Noah Gragson tags the wall with a tire down, but it also seems to be tire-mageddon as under the ensuing caution, William Byron, Connor Zilisch and Michael McDowell all have tires go down too. 

Lap 167: Back to green.  Denny Hamlin took two tires on pit road and leads the field to green.  As concern over tire wear continues to grow, there’s a mixture of teams who have put qualifying scuffs on here to conserve fresh tires for later in the race.

Lap 174: With Hamlin only having two fresh tires, he gives up the lead to Christopher Bell who has 4 fresh sticker tires.

Lap 185: Bell wins Stage Two.

Lap 191:  Christopher Bell wins the race off pit road again.

Lap 197: Final stage is green!

Lap 209: CAUTION for Ryan Preece spinning after some contact with Connor Zilisch.

Lap 213: As pit road opens, more and more concern that the 8 sets of tires given to teams might not be enough to make it to the end.

Lap 217: Just as we go back green, another CAUTION comes out involving quite a few cars.  Joey Logano put Chastain in a bad spot and ended up spinning him into a sea of 4-and-5-wide in the dog leg. 

Lap 225: Back to green.  Josh Berry and Christopher Bell on the front row.

Lap 228:  Riley Herbst bounces off the wall, but manages to not cause another caution.

Lap 246:  CAUTION – SVG is around after some contact from Austin Dillon. 

Lap 248: Pits open, almost everyone comes down for tires.  Chris Buescher gets a speeding penalty.

Lap 253: Back to green.

LAP 254: CAUTION – Logano, Josh Berry and Daniel Suarez are all involved. 

Lap 264: Lots to clean up after that caution, so finally we are back to green.

Lap 282:  Connor Zilisch makes it to pit road with a tire down – no caution.

Lap 286:  Austin Hill, driving the 33 car for RCR, also has a tire down, and also makes it to pit road without a caution.

Lap 288:  CAUTION – Austin Dillon has a tire down.

Lap 290:  Pits open, pretty much everyone comes down, but some are at a disadvantage because of taking too many tires earlier in the race.  Ty Gibbs wins the race off pit road with two tires.  Bell comes out P7 with four tires.

Lap 294:  Back to green, but CAUTION immediately again, as Zane Smith, Ty Dillon and John Hunter Nemechek tangle in the back of the pack.

Lap 301: Back to green with 12 to go in the race.

Lap 303:  Ty Gibbs loses the lead to Ryan Blaney.

Lap 305:  Christopher Bell makes it to P2, being on four fresh tires.  Blaney is leading.

Lap 312:  Blaney WINS the race, holding off the charging Christopher Bell.  He ends the 23XI winning streak, and also earns a Team Penske sweep for the weekend at Phoenix, as their IndyCar counterparts won over the weekend too.

Tyler Reddick finished P8, but still has a 60-point standings lead over Blaney who is now in 2nd place.

Next weekend we head to Las Vegas!