There is no doubt that the road to reaching the top flight of American Stock Car Racing is not an easy process. There are several stages one must master before getting the call-up to compete against some of the best American racing drivers in the NASCAR Cup Series.
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For many, NASCAR is often ingrained into their lives as they grow up, considering the proximity of tracks and accessible events to observe and learn from. However, for Joe Gibbs Racing driver Christopher Bell things had not been that accessible.
Recently, while speaking in an interview, Bell revealed how growing up away from the immediate realm of NASCAR ended up impacting him.
Christopher Bell explains if NASCAR had ever been on his radar growing up
Fox Sports journalist Bob Pockrass asked Bell if NASCAR had always been on his radar considering he grew up in Oklahoma.
Subsequently, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver responded, “I never, never in my life, did I have NASCAR on my radar. Just growing up from Oklahoma, there literally is no NASCAR. To my knowledge, there’s not another Oklahoma NASCAR guy. So I never thought it was a possibility.”
“Never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be in the Cup Series. I always aimed to be a professional racer, and dirt racing was the most logical answer because that’s what we have in Oklahoma, that’s what I grew up doing.”
Growing up in Oklahoma, Christopher Bell never thought he’d race in NASCAR and explains how that maybe has impacted how he approaches his NASCAR racing. pic.twitter.com/fJvwEe2SFC
— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) October 4, 2023
He then added how he was fortunate enough to be paired with Toyota, who provided his first opportunity to race on asphalt instead of the dirt tracks he had been habituated to.
Bell shares if being away from NASCAR helped him in any way or form
Further, into the conversation, Pockrass asked if growing up in an environment without NASCAR aided him in anyway, especially in terms of his approach towards certain things when compared to his fellow competitors.
“One thing that growing up in Oklahoma, and not having NASCAR on my radar, one thing that I think is very beneficial is I learned to love the process. I love the process of driving race cars for a living, and I never in a million years thought I would be a NASCAR driver.”
The JGR driver finally added that he just wished to become a professional racing driver when he grew up. Becoming a NASCAR driver hadn’t been something he could fathom early on.
However, he feels exceptionally fortunate to have been able to make it into the top flight of American stock car racing. Additionally, he expressed that he was, “just as happy 10 years ago,” while racing midgets and sprint cars.
