Despite driving the fastest and arguably the best car last Sunday, Christopher Bell was narrowly defeated by Joey Logano in the South Point 400, allowing Logano to secure a spot in the Championship 4. The #22 driver, with his three wins and six top-5 finishes, was seen as an underdog this season. But Bell has notched three wins and fourteen top-5 finishes himself.
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While the #20 Joe Gibbs Racing driver is only second to Kyle Larson, who has claimed six wins this season, he rarely gets mentioned as a favorite or seen as a significant threat in the field.
Denny Hamlin recently drew parallels between Bell and Matt Kenseth, noting that just as Kenseth was often overshadowed by peers like Tony Stewart or Jimmie Johnson, Bell too seems to be cast in a similar, underestimated role.
During his post-race interview, Hamlin reflected, “A lot of the metrics that I look at show that he’s one of the fastest when it comes to setting fast lap times and driver ratings, and things like that – probably laying in the weeds is a good way to summarize that 20 team and Christopher (Bell), but I think some of it is also his personality.”
He elaborated, “He’s not outspoken that much. He’s soft-spoken, so typically people like that always fly under the radar. Matt Kenseth – I consider them very, very similar, when I think about who Christopher is, and I got to work with both of them. I feel like there is a lot of Matt Kenseth in Christopher, kind of with their personalities and their talent level.”
Hamlin raced alongside Kenseth for many years and was his teammate at JGR for five, and he is currently racing alongside Bell as well. Both drivers made significant playoff runs but often didn’t receive as much attention as some of their high-profile teammates, like Kyle Busch or Larson, and in Bell‘s case, even Hamlin himself.
Previewing Bell’s upcoming Round of 8 races
The #20 Toyota Camry driver currently holds the runner-up spot in the driver standings with a comfortable 42-point buffer. However, with two races left in the Round of 8, winners from the playoff contenders will punch their tickets to the Championship automatically. If not, advancement will hinge on the points tally.
As one of the most consistent performers, Bell has logged top-5 finishes in six out of his last ten races, and top-10s in two. The upcoming showdowns are set for Homestead-Miami Speedway and Martinsville Speedway, where Bell’s average finishes are 10.0 and 16.2, respectively.
Bell, who has four Cup starts at Homestead, clinched a victory there in 2023, making him the defending champion this season. At Martinsville, out of nine starts, he has one win from 2022 and two additional top-10 finishes.
With the tracks ahead looking favorable for the Joe Gibbs Racing driver, it remains to be seen if he can clinch a spot in the Championship 4 by winning one of the upcoming races.
