You’d consider P7 a decent result for any driver but looking at how Christopher Bell drove, he had every right to be disappointed. Only he wasn’t as much. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver was well within a shot of winning the race at the WWT Gateway but an engine failure with about 20 laps to go ruined his chances.
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It would have been a personal milestone for the 29-year-old who has never won back-to-back Cup Series races so far in his career. However, thanks to Martin Truex Jr‘s bump drafting, Bell was able to finish P7. He was pretty grateful for the result, especially considering that he was not expecting to finish the race at one point.
“I don’t know, something broke in the engine. I don’t know if it was a plug wire getting burned or whatever but I didn’t expect to finish the race. So the fact that we were able to walk out of here with a top 10 is…I don’t know, it sucks to say that it was a good day but two stage wins and a race car that was pretty unbelievable so we’ve got great notes for when we come back here and just one less in the win column,” he said.
Some people were surprised to see how well the driver of the #20 car ran considering so many others had problems with grip. It turns out that his dirt racing background could have played a part in it.
How did Christopher Bell manage the lack of grip so well?
Dirt racing is among the toughest forms of motorsports there is since one’s control needs to be impeccable. So when there is no grip on an asphalt surface and a car starts sliding around, a dirt racer will feel right at home thanks to their experience. That’s exactly what happened with Christopher Bell on Sunday as well.
“I think that dirt racing, if you have it in your background, that’s what you grew up doing, it teaches it how to maximize your car. Maybe I got that going for me but the bottom line is that this thing was just super fast,” the #20 driver added. He will be looking to come back stronger after his experience in St Louis and hopefully be able to win a race soon.
