Last month, it was revealed that Christopher Bell’s crew chief Adam Stevens had injured his knees and would be away from the race track for a fair amount of time. The #20 team has had Chris Sherwood at the helm since, with Stevens monitoring and advising them from Joe Gibbs Racing’s command center. Stevens and Bell have a professional relationship spanning several years but Sherwood’s work so far has been more than satisfactory for the driver.
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Bell was recently asked on an episode of The Teardown about Stevens’ recovery. He explained how the #20 crew chief has been able to walk for a while now. The hope is that he will be back on the race track before the end of the season. This year, he might finally see his driver win the Cup Series title after two seasons of qualifying for the championship four race and not winning it.
“He’s doing really good and the whole time he has been far and above how I expected him to be doing,” Bell said. “He can’t bend his knees but he was walking since day one whenever I saw him. I expected him to be…I didn’t know if he was going to be in a wheelchair or what but yeah he can’t bend his knees so it is a little funny to watch him walk.”
The pair picked up three race wins in the regular season, putting the #20 team in a great position. This is the most points he has had going into a playoff round and Bell will be looking to take full advantage of that. Hopefully, he does not have to rely on those points to get through the first round.
Bell never expected a big difference without a regular crew chief
Some fans expected the #20 car to struggle after Stevens’ temporary departure but that has not been the case. The car has run as consistently as it has done this whole season. When the injury was announced, Bell said that he wasn’t too worried. Sherwood has what it takes to get the job done. Plus, if something went wrong, Stevens was always in contact with the team to help them out.
“Obviously, the playoffs are really important but honestly, if we don’t have technical difficulties from communication from Huntersville to the race track, then it’s not going to be much different. So as long as everything goes to plan, I’m not going to notice a difference in the car,” he said previously.
He has one of the best cars in the field but Bell is slightly concerned about the first round of the playoffs. Starting at a place like the Atlanta Motor Speedway is never easy but the #20 team will do whatever it takes to finish as high up as possible.
