Tyler Reddick has had a strong start to the 2026 season, with the 23XI Racing driver winning four of the first seven races and building an early points lead.

That run has already created a gap in the standings, but Joey Logano is not worried despite Reddick’s early advantage.

"No, I'm not okay," Logano told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. "No, we shouldn't be okay with it either. But I mean, the points already are, right? Like, there's not much you can do about it right now, about the past."

While Reddick has enjoyed a strong start, it has been an underwhelming run for Logano. With just two top-five and two top-10 finishes, the Team Penske driver sits 12th in the Drivers' Standings.

Logano’s championship runs in 2018 and 2022 did not rely on early-season dominance. In both cases, he built momentum later in the year and peaked during the playoffs, showing that a mid-pack standing at this stage does not rule him out of contention.

The return of the Chase format in 2026 shifts the focus toward holding form over a longer stretch.

That kind of volatility is already visible. Bubba Wallace went from second to 11th across Darlington and Martinsville, which is exactly the kind of swing Logano was pointing to.

Logano is still outside the cut line pressure zone for now, with 19 races left to work with before the postseason, and Martinsville was at least a step in the right direction.

Former NASCAR Driver Lauded Joey Logano’s Rebound at Martinsville

Former NASCAR driver Kevin Harvick praised Joey Logano after the #22 driver delivered a strong performance at Martinsville a couple of weeks ago. After being lapped three times at Darlington, the turnaround stood out, Harvick said.

He pointed to how Joey Logano reset the following week and delivered a strong finish at Martinsville, extending his run of top-10 results at the track to 14, as reported by Heavy.com.

He added that the team qualified up front and stayed competitive throughout the race, calling it the right way to respond after being lapped three times the previous week.

Currently, Tyler Reddick leads the championship with 353 points, followed by Ryan Blaney with 271. Denny Hamlin, Chase Elliott, and William Byron round out the top five with 259, 249, and 238 points, respectively.

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Written by

Sabyasachi Biswas

Edited by

Pulkit Prabhav