For nearly 30 minutes Christopher Bell’s potential status as a Championship 4 contender was up in the air as NASCAR attempted to determine whether Bell intentionally performed a wall-riding move on the last lap of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway to gain the point he needed to advance to the Championship 4.
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RACE RESULTS: NASCAR Cup Series Xfinity 500 at Martinsville
Following the race, Bell admitted that as he crossed the finish line and thought he had locked up his Championship 4 berth, he had no idea that he was facing a potential penalty until he parked his car on pit road.
“No, I never once thought that’s what I would get penalized — I didn’t even think I was going to get a penalty at all. I didn’t know a penalty was in the cards,” Bell explained.
Should Christopher Bell race for the NASCAR Championship?
Watch this move on the final lap. pic.twitter.com/3A3BrNe0fd
— NASCAR on NBC (@NASCARonNBC) November 3, 2024
At that moment, the joyous feeling of locking into the Playoffs subsided and was replaced with anxiousness. As Bell, who was joined by crew chief Adam Stevens, Coach Joe Gibbs, and Aric Almirola, sat in anguish on pit road awaiting the call to come, you could see the nervousness on the 29-year-old racer’s face.
Then, the call came. NASCAR had determined that Bell would be assessed an in-race safety penalty for wall-riding, which would drop him from an 18th-place finish to 22nd, the final car one lap down. The deduction in finishing position was enough to bump Bell from the Championship 4 field, which secured a berth for William Byron.
While Bell was thankful to even have a shot at advancing to the Championship 4 after a slew of issues mired him in the field throughout the race, he didn’t agree with the call that NASCAR made for his incident on the last lap. Bell contends that he didn’t intentionally ride the wall, but rather that he made a mistake, got into the wall, and at that point did what he needed to do.
Christopher Bell says his intent was not to ride the wall to gain positions at the end of the race and while he’s disappointed to be eliminated from the Playoffs, he’s proud of all that he and the 20 team have accomplished this year. pic.twitter.com/iqeXeHFzYP
— Toby Christie (@Toby_Christie) November 3, 2024
“No, I mean, I made a mistake and I slid into the wall. And unfortunately, they ruled that as a safety violation, I guess,” Bell explained.
In a press conference after the race, Elton Sawyer, NASCAR Vice President of Competition explained why the incident resulted in a safety infraction. It all stems from Ross Chastain’s “Hail-Melon” move on the final lap at Martinsville in 2022, where he went full speed into the outside wall. Chastain would ride the wall and would pass several cars in the final set of turns to advance to the Championship 4.
While the move was spectacular, the concern was that Chastain’s car could have dislodged the crossover gate in Turn 4, which could have been a disastrous situation.
“Yeah, obviously we look at all the videos. As I back up on that, you go back two years ago when we had the situation with Ross here. We went to Phoenix. There was a lot of dialogue with the drivers that that’s not a move that we want to have to make on the last lap. We were able to get through Phoenix and had a great championship race that year,” Sawyer recalled.
“In the off-season meeting [following the 2022 season] with the industry, meeting with our drivers, and to a man that was not a move that they want to have to make. There was language in the rule back. When you look at it today, clearly got up against the fence there in three and four, and rode the fans all the way off four there. Strictly [the rule is] to protect our drivers as well as our fans. So yeah, it was pretty straightforward.”
Adding to the frustration and confusion for Bell was the fact that he didn’t advance his position, or gain any time on the competition, which indicates that he didn’t intentionally wall-ride during his last lap excursion into the wall, which he felt made the incident different than Ross Chastain’s 2022 “Hail Melon”.
“I don’t know what to say, I mean, I didn’t advance my position into the wall. I lost time on the racetrack, but, it’s not meant to be. And it’s fine,” Bell said holding back his emotions.
While he didn’t agree with the call, Bell stopped short of calling the ruling unfair.
“I am going to keep my mouth shut,” Bell stated.
While the Bell ruling was a big, controversial moment at the end of the race, it wasn’t the only controversy in the closing laps of Sunday’s Xfinity 500. Several cars are believed to have possibly participated in in-race manipulation in the closing laps to try to assist William Byron’s and Christopher Bell’s efforts to lock into the Championship 4.
Bell said the Chevrolet assist, which allegedly came from Ross Chastain and Austin Dillon in the closing laps was very egregious.
“It was clear what was going on,” Bell explained. “[Byron] came back to me probably a straightaway or something. But, it just wasn’t meant to be today, and it wasn’t meant to be this year. And we accomplished a lot this year, and I’m proud of that. Just keep building on it.”
Sawyer says that while NASCAR ruled on Bell’s last-lap situation on Sunday night, the sanctioning body will review data, video, and in-car audio from the cars having allegations levied against them.
“Yeah, we’ll look at everything,” Sawyer said. “As I said earlier, we want to go back, as we would have done anyway. We’ll get back, we’ll take all the data, video. We’ll listen to in-car audio. We’ll do all that, as we would any event.”
When pressed on if there could be penalties that stem from anything found in the investigation, Sawyer reiterated that NASCAR will look at everything.
Regardless of how that all shakes out, Bell wanted to let everyone know that he wasn’t stressing about being bounced from the Playoffs, and he’s already looking forward to trying to make the Championship 4 again in 2025.
“I’m not bitter,” Bell stated. “It wasn’t meant to be. I’m proud of the successes that we’ve had in 2024. It’s a bummer to not go to Phoenix because obviously, that’s a track that we’re really good at, but thankfully I’ve got a couple of more years on my contract so I’ll get another shot at it.”
Following the ruling, Bell approached Byron and congratulated his competitor for advancing to the Championship 4.
Good sportsmanship, it was on display between @CBellRacing and @WilliamByron after tonight’s ruling by #NASCAR. Let’s normalize good sportsmanship. pic.twitter.com/ueA3TWqFsP
— Toby Christie (@Toby_Christie) November 3, 2024
Despite the heartbreaking end to his championship hopes, Bell was still very gracious in defeat.
