Christopher Bell Claims 7th Cup Series Career Win With Resounding Phoenix Victory

It was an outright domination of the Toyotas at the Phoenix Raceway. While Tyler Reddick drew first blood acing the first stage of the race to take his first such win of 2024, it was ultimately JGR driver Christopher Bell who claimed the ultimate prize outrunning Reddick in a close battle.

With that being said, the Toyota vs. Toyota war reached a high point when the #45 23XI Racing car seemed like it was going for another stage win in the second stage, all when the JGR driver came back rallying, passing car after car to catch up to Denny Hamlin and his driver in lap 166. Bell then passed the #11 Toyota only to overtake the 23XI Racing Toyota of Reddick in lap 181 and kept the lead till lap 187 to win stage 2 of the race.

Christopher Bell put an end to HMS’ domination, picking up JGR’s first win

Christopher Bell took home Joe Gibbs Racing’s first win of 2024 after battling back from 20th on the final restart. Well, as it turned out, that wasn’t the end of it. Bell kept the momentum going until he won the later and final stage of the race to win his seventh Cup Series win and his first one this season. However, this doesn’t mean the driver’s win was a cakewalk. The #20 driver rallied from P20 after the late restart to filter his way through the traffic and reach the front.

Re-entering the top-10, Bell had the speed, courtesy of a timely four-tire change. He then kept the pace going, gradually climbing up the ladder, passing Gibbs’ #54 car for second, and coming five seconds behind the then-race leader, Martin Truex Jr. Finally, in lap 271, Bell retook the lead, only to keep it till the end of the race., winning Toyota their first race of the season, ending the Chevy domination with a strong statement.

Reflecting on the redemption, Bell credited his crew chief and crew for backing him up with a fantastic racecar. Speaking in the post-race interview, he said, “This one feels really good and just a credit to Adam, man. Adam, White Knight, William, my engineers, my crew chief, and all the mechanics on this thing. You don’t get cars like that very often as you know, so just super, super proud. Proud to be on this #20 car. You know, this dream Camry was amazing today.” 

JGR basks in the glory of Toyota’s new Camry XSE at Phoenix

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Unlike the past three races where Chevy took the lead, winning all three in grand fashion, the one-mile desert track at Phoenix saw a massive turnaround when the Japanese manufacturer turned on the heat. In total, the Toyota cars led a total of 298 laps out of the 312, winning all the stages to annihilate the competition, blowing the ever-dominant HMS Chevys out of P1 contention.

“For Toyota, this was a momentous win,” said David Wilson, president of Toyota Racing Development USA after Sunday’s win. The new and updated Camry XSE shined through with NASCAR’s latest short-track package debuting at the track. In fact, it was a strong showing for the manufacturer, with their cars dominating all throughout in practice, qualifying, and the actual race. And for as strong as Bell was, his 50 laps led were just fifth-most of the six different leaders, trailing Denny Hamlin (68 laps led), Tyler Reddick (68), Ty Gibbs (57), and Martin Truex Jr. (55) except for Ford’s Todd Gilliland, who led the 14 laps that Toyota didn’t.

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