There was nobody in the state of Nevada as fast as Christopher Bell on Sunday (Oct. 20).
The Norman, Okla. native dominated the South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, but his dominant performance left him one spot shy of a visit to victory lane and a guaranteed berth in the Championship 4.
On a day where most of the playoff field suffered innumerable setbacks, Bell’s No. 20 was a blazing-fast beacon of light for Joe Gibbs Racing, whose other playoff driver in Denny Hamlin spent most of the afternoon floundering in the back of the field.
Only Tyler Reddick – who started and ran second to Bell for much of stage 1 – denied Bell the victory in the opening stage. After Reddick went for a unscheduled flight through the infield grass, Bell got around Ty Gibbs for the race lead on the ensuing restart.
As Bell pulled away, his race seemed to be shaping up perfectly. The man thought to be his main championship rival – Kyle Larson – was buried in the field after issues on pit road, with Ryan Blaney, Reddick, Hamlin and Chase Elliott all hanging around towards the back of the field.
Despite a strong challenge from teammate Martin Truex Jr., Bell won stage 2.
As stage 3 began, Bell found himself once more in the race lead, but questions about late-race strategy were already swirling on pit road. Contrary to popular belief, Bell and most of the leaders opted to split the stage in half, leaving only a few stragglers to fend for themselves on fuel mileage.
Daniel Suarez, Joey Logano and Hamlin were all considered to be throwing a Hail Mary from their own 20-yard line. Even if they were good to the end on gas, a victory seemed unlikely. Bell was charging hard and had managed to stay ahead of Alex Bowman, who had turned into his biggest challenge for the win over the previous green-flag run.
With 29 laps to go, Bell’s deficit to race leader Suarez was just over 23 laps, and with the No. 20 making up a second per lap, the math was in Bell’s favor.
But, as NBC Sports’ Steve Letarte pointed out, the variable of traffic came into play. Several minute hiccups by Bell made his deficit to the leaders tick slightly slower than the scoring pylon counting off the laps, and even after Logano and Suarez battled for the lead, Bell needed a Hail Mary of his own to score the win.
The final margin of victory for Logano ended up being only 0.662 seconds – equivalent to a lap or less over the final run of the race.
Bell led…
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