Christopher Bell won a chaotic race at Bristol Motor Speedway on Saturday to advance to the round of 12 in the NASCAR Playoffs.
Bell would join teammates Denny Hamlin and Chase Briscoe as playoff winners, to give Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) the first-round sweep.
The race at Bristol was quite special because NASCAR and Goodyear implemented a new soft tire that shook up the field entirely. The new soft tire lasted between 30 and 70 laps on average, depending on how hard you pushed, and made racing interesting as the fall off was intense.
A.J. Allmendinger would start on pole and lead up until lap 25 when Ty Gibbs passed him. Allmendinger would pit on lap 30 for fresh tires after he felt his tire coming apart.
By lap 53, 31 out of the 39 drivers had pitted for fresh tires and by lap 66 every driver had pitted for the first time with Ryan Blaney being the last driver to pit road.
On lap 77, Josh Berry’s car caught fire, ending his race and bringing out a caution. Berry’s exit eliminated him from the playoffs after not finishing all three first round races.
The next caution would come out on lap 101 because of an Alex Bowman spin into turn two. Bowman had no damage from the spin and Briscoe would be the free pass.
On lap 126 Blaney would win stage one followed by Gibbs and William Byron.
The third race-incident caution came on Lap 147 when Riley Herbst and Ricky Stenhouse got into a wreck on the front stretch of the track. Bell would be the free pass.
On lap 162, Goodyear and NASCAR were deciding if they would let teams buy an extra pair of tires for the race.
The fourth race-incident caution came out on lap 239 after Shane Van Gisbergen spun in turns three and four and with four laps in the stage green flag racing would resume.
Stage two would be won by Gibbs followed by Blaney and Bowman. Byron was the free pass.
On lap 256, NASCAR announced they would be releasing another pair of tires for all the teams once they mounted enough for everyone.
Just four laps into the final stage, Van Gisbergen got bumped by Ty Dillon in turn two and spun bringing out another caution. Michael McDowell was the free pass.
Shortly after Briscoe took the lead the sixth race-incident caution came out after Cole Custer spun. Gibbs, Hamlin and Bowman would pit during the caution.
On lap 311, the seventh race-incident caution came out after Chase Elliott got into the wall. Elliott had a lot of damage on the front end of his car and did not finish the race.
With 150 laps to go in the race, Briscoe led, followed by Bell and Gibbs.
50 laps later, Gibbs moved to second place and on lap 417 Gibbs would take the lead. Gibbs led the most laps out of any driver with 201 laps led.
On lap 451 Brad Keselowski led followed by Carson Hocevar and Smith.
The final caution came out on lap 488, when Bubba Wallace got into the wall after some contact with Custer.
With four laps to go the race went green with Hocevar, Smith, Bowman and Keselowski fighting for the win. Hocevar and Smith are winless in their career, Bowman and Keselowski are winless this season.
Bell would take the lead from Hocevar with three laps left in the race and wouldn’t let it go as he would help JGR sweep the first round.
The four drivers who did not make the round of 12 are Austin Dillon, Bowman, Van Gisbergen and Berry.
The drivers advancing to the round of 12 are Briscoe, Hamlin, Bell, Blaney, Byron, Kyle Larson, Wallace, Tyler Reddick, Joey Logano, Ross Chastain, Elliott and Austin Cindric.