Herbst tops Chicagoland Cup Series practice

Riley Herbst topped NASCAR Cup Series practice in the return of Chicagoland Speedway to the NASCAR schedule.

Herbst ran a fast lap of 178.065 mph (30.326 seconds). He did so near the end of the session.

Herbst led the way over his 23XI Racing teammate Bubba Wallace. Wallace's fast lap was 177.930 mph.

Kyle Larson was third-fastest (177.877 mph), Denny Hamlin was fourth-fastest (177.877 mph), and Ty Gibbs completed the top five (177.754 mph). Corey Heim was sixth-fastest (177.643 mph), Austin Cindric was seventh-fastest (177.643 mph), and Tyler Reddick was eighth-fastest (177.526 mph).

Carson Hocevar was ninth fastest (177.223 mph), and Chris Buescher rounded out the top 10 (176.858 mph).

Austin Cindric was fastest in the five-lap average, while Reddick was fastest in the 10-, 15-, and 20-lap averages. Reddick is not the point leader for the first time this year as the Cup Series takes the green flag Sunday.

“I do think our Jordan Brand Camry is really good,” Reddick said. “We don’t get a lot of 50-minute practices anymore. But today was a bit weird; I don’t know, the tire falloff was pretty flat. This is a tire we run at other intermediates where we see a lot of tire fall off and the surface has age to it, and it was just strange. It didn’t act like a surface as old as it is.

“So, we’re just trying to understand that, what we can continue to fine-tune on our Toyota. But in general, pretty happy and feeling pretty good about where we’re at.”

There were no significant incidents in the session.

There are 38 teams entered at Chicagoland. In addition to the charter teams, the Open entries are JJ Yeley for NY Racing Team and Heim for 23XI Racing.

NEXT: Cup Series qualifying at 3 p.m. ET Sunday.

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