Christopher Bell returned to victory lane this weekend under the lights of the Bass Pro Shops Bristol Night Race. His victory made it three-for-three for Joe Gibbs Racing in the Round of 16.
The cutoff race for the Playoffs Round of 16 brought the NASCAR Cup Series to ‘the last great colosseum’: Bristol Motor Speedway. Bristol’s night race has historically flared tempers and applied severe pressure on even the greatest drivers to grace the sport.
Tonight, the pressure was on as the Round of 16 came to a close, with drivers trying to avoid elimination from the 2025 Cup Series Playoffs, including Alex Bowman, 25 points below the cut line, who started 15th.
Championship favourites Kyle Larson and Denny Hamlin lined up fifth and sixth respectively. Hamlin has five wins this year, and came fresh off a win at Iowa last weekend, while Kyle Larson has led over 400 laps in both of the last Bristol races. Meanwhile, it was Kaulig Racing’s AJ Allmendinger who took his first Cup Series pole in 10 years:
Nestled in the Tennessee Mountains, this high-banked, half-mile oval is known for tight racing and quick laps. With turns up to 30 degrees and straight too short to build speed on, Bristol is a difficult track to pass. Brad Keselowski said: “The challenge of Bristol is working the traffic and knowing where the grip is – and it moves around. Some laps it’s on the bottom, and some laps it’s on the top. And timing it just right to make passes is really tricky.”
Stage one of the night race kicked off with Allmendinger initially breaking away. Meanwhile last week’s winner, the #11 of Denny Hamlin, fell seven places back, failing to get to the bottom of the track early on.
Tyre issues for Allmendinger forced him to give up the lead and pit for a new set of Goodyears, handing the lead to Ty Gibbs. His lead was short-lived, however, as he struggled to pass lapped traffic and slipped behind Ryan Blaney’s #12 Penske Ford.
The tyres were barely lasting 40 laps – and pit road chaos ensued. Denny Hamlin spoke on his podcast, Actions Detrimental, on Monday claiming the new softer-than-ever Bristol tyres for the weekend completely disintegrated during a sandbelt test – even shredding the machine itself to pieces.
With tyres down to the chords, each team cycled through the pits and Gibbs came out on top. Blaney was the last of the leaders to pit, and came out over a lap down from the race leader.
On lap 76, the #21 Wood Brothers Ford of Josh Berry took to pit road with a major fire. The caution fell with all the safety workers surrounding the blazing car on pit road. Berry escaped, albeit not comfortably, and headed for the infield care centre.
Gibbs retained the lead when pit road opened. He then cleared William Byron who restarted beside him as they came to lap 96 of 125 in stage one.
Alex Bowman spun on lap 100 getting squeezed onto the apron by the #35 of Riley Herbst, and brought out a caution.
The field restarted into lap 108 with a sprint to the end of stage one. A gutsy call by crew chief Jonathan Hassler allowed Ryan Blaney to win stage one on new tyres, carving his way through the pack with precision and cadence. He won by barely a nose over Ty Gibbs as they battled through traffic.
Gibbs took only right-side tyres under the stage caution to reclaim the lead off pit road and stormed ahead on the restart. 22 laps in, Ricky Stenhouse Jr spun following contact with Riley Herbst. In avoidance, Michael McDowell and Erik Jones also spun.
Wallace’s #23 Toyota wiggled on the power coming to the restart, letting Gibbs saunter away in the lead.
With 13 to go, Shane van Gisbergen spun and the caution came out. He slid up the track into the tyre debris and completely lost the car.
Stenhouse did not pit under caution and took the outside to kick off a four-lap sprint to the end of stage two. Gibbs on the inside ran away up front to claim the stage two victory from, once again, a hard-charging Blaney.
With 234 laps to go in the Bass Pro Shops Bristol Night Race, Ty Gibbs fired off for stage three as Alex Bowman was completely swamped on the inside, promoting Chris Buescher to second place.
A flurry of short cautions prompted a division of strategies as teams tried to pick the right moment to pit for precious new rubber. To their relief, NASCAR and Goodyear released an extra set of tyres for all teams to use, given the extreme wear shown by the rubber this evening.
One such caution fell on lap 60 when Chase Elliott slammed into the outside wall in turns three and four with contact from John-Hunter Nemechek behind. The damage was heavy – and it was not long before Elliott was called out of the car when a quick inspection diagnosed unfixable damage.
His playoff chances were now under pressure, as Hendrick team-mate Alex Bowman would need to win to eliminate Elliott from the round of 16.
Bubba Wallace led the field back to green with fellow Toyota driver Gibbs on his inside. However, it was Briscoe who took the lead after a few laps, swiftly followed by Chris Buescher – the pair had 21-lap fresher tyres than the others around them with 161 laps to go.
On lap 354, Wallace and Stenhouse came together. The #23, on finished tyres, ran up the track into the #47 Chevy, spinning him into the wall with minor damage. Wallace apologised over the radio: “Go find the #47, I can’t turn and I’m a sitting duck, sorry.”
Lap 383 saw an accident between Hamlin and Allmendinger, where Hamlin’s right-front wheel detached from the #11 and pushed it up the track into the polesitter, bringing out the 13th caution of the night.
Briscoe and Gibbs led the field to green with 103 to go. Bell took the lead with 70 to go while Buescher and Bowman hit pit road. The lead cycled several times with pit stops.
With 43 to go, Austin Cindric pulled to pit road with a fire, eerily similar to the #21 of josh Berry earlier. He dropped several positions – and valuable points – to leave him just four points above the playoff cut line. Meanwhile, Alex Bowman was on a charge to give himself those points.
He entered the top two and chased Hocevar for the lead, but suddenly, with 29 to go, Bowman started dropping places and was forced to hit pit road. Leader Hocevar reacted with a stop the next lap. He was 10 seconds back with 15 to go, and lapping a second faster than non-stopper Brad Keselowski.
Then a caution dropped with 13 to go – as Wallace slammed into the wall in a chain reaction off the front of Keselowski.
Hocevar, Zane Smith and Bowman stayed out, making up the top three. Keselowski and Bell in fourth and fifth took two tyres. Corey Heim, in his first Cup Series start at Bristol, took four fresh Goodyears in seventh.
The green flag dropped and Hocevar was pushed up high by Smith, giving way for Bell to take the lead on the inside, followed by Keselowski – who was not done yet – as he gave Bell a shove on the final lap but it was not enough, and Christopher Bell returned to winning ways in 2025.
His victory made it three-for-three for Joe Gibbs Racing in the Round of 16.
“Bristol freakin’ night race, how about that fellas?!” he said on the radio during his Polish victory lap.
Alex Bowman missed out on the round of 12 by 10 points, while Austin Cindric and Chase Elliott escaped elimination. Bowman joined SVG, Berry and Austin Dillon in being eliminated from the playoffs.
Stepping from his car, Bell exclaimed: “Any week – any given week – it could be us. And it hadn’t been us for a long time… But Bristol, baby! Tonight it’s us!”
The NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs continue with the Round of 12 starting at Loudon, New Hampshire next Sunday.
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