Kevin Harvick Issues Stern Injustice Notice to NASCAR Against Wood Brothers’ & Co. After Christopher Bell’s Antics

“Every time I stopped in somebody else’s box, there was usually a fight,” said Kevin Harvick, expressing his surprise and concern over Christopher Bell’s emergency pit stop at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Bell’s race took a dramatic turn when his crew failed to properly tighten the left front wheel during a routine pit stop. Faced with the risk of a loose wheel penalty, crew chief Adam Stevens made a bold decision to have Bell pull into teammate Chase Briscoe’s pit box for an adjustment. While this quick-thinking maneuver prevented a dangerous situation, it also sparked controversy about fairness and whether such actions should be permissible within NASCAR’s framework.

As it turns out the No. 20 team were wary about these concerns and did what they could to salvage the situation. “It’s something that we’ve talked about before. It’s a situation that’s come up in the past, and it’s been discussed with NASCAR. So, it could prevent a wheel going across the racetrack or a dangerous situation.” Bell’s crew chief Adam Stevens said.

Although the No. 20 prevented the wheel from going off loose on the track and spoiling someone else’s race, it wasn’t entirely fair. NASCAR did send Bell to the rear of the field for the restart, but teams and other pit crews saw how they could deal with situation in future. And this could lead to a new trend within the garage which Harvick feels wouldn’t be fair on small teams.

Kevin Harvick bats out for single-car NASCAR teams after Bell’s Vegas antics

It is important to note that a loose wheel on the racetrack leads to the ejection of the pit crew members for at least two races. Even Kyle Larson found himself on the bitter end of things with a loose wheel during the COTA race. So, there seems to be a genuine concern with the single-lug nut wheel system on he Next Gen car. But, Bell and his team didn’t want to get hit by a pit crew penalty and therefore they improvised and were able to see out the race in Vegas.

Given that NASCAR hasn’t penalized the #20 team for their antics, teams will look to add this trick to their bags when to head to Homestead Miami. But, this won’t be fair on the teams who have limited or single charters as they won’t have extra pit boxes to rely on during such incidents. Kevin Harvick expressed this concern on Happy Hour, “What about the guy who only has one car, is that fair, who doesn’t have a teammate to stop in their box?”

 “If Chase Elliott decides he’s going to pull into Chase Briscoe’s box, is it okay? Or is he just there for the sale? So now every team is going to do it. I agree with the safer piece of it, it’s better to not have the wheel fall off, but is it fair? Because in the end, it has to be fair,” Harvick added. 

The likes of Rickware Racing, Wood Brothers Racing, and Hyak Motorsports have one full-time charter each. In case their race car has loose wheels in the pits, where will they pit? Of course, the legacy teams can rely on their teammates like Bell did, but none of the other small teams will be able to pull this stunt off. So Harvick’s question about this being fair is indeed genuine.

It’s not that Christopher Bell’s team did something wrong, well they had the option and they took it to soften the blow. And loose wheels have been a running problem since the start of the 2025 season. So is NASCAR aware of the situation and what are they doing to solve this major concern?

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2022 season’s woes hitting the Cup Series garage again

The Next-Gen car was first introduced in 2022 and it came with a major revamp including the 18-inch wheel fastened by a single lug nut instead of five smaller ones. The average pit stop time was reduced drastically, but with the speed came mistakes and errors. This is where the cars started to have loose wheel issues and subsequently, the teams involved with these troubles were penalized.

Well, the 2025 season has seen a similar uptick in incidents. Apart from Bell his teammate Briscoe and former JGR driver Kyle Busch also had issues with their tires. Then there is Kyle Larson’s incident at COTA, so there seems to be a genuine concern with how the single-lug nut system is functioning. As it turns out NASCAR is aware of this ongoing issues with race car and are working behind the scenes to find a resolution soon.

“It’s kind of odd that we saw a couple in the past few weeks. And then we saw two on the track.” Cup Series Managing Director Brad Moran said this on Sirius XM Radio. “I’ve been discussing it with a lot of the crew chiefs and managers. And yeah, I wouldn’t so quickly say it was the wheel weight. I think it’s about time as well and timing and trying to get as much done as you can in the shortest period of time. Again, you push it to the limit and unfortunately, if that car hits the ground before that nut’s tight, we’ve had this problem.”

With the teams pushing close to 8-second range pit stops, such problems and incidents are only to rise in future. It will be interesting to see how NASCAR handles the situation without affecting the components of the race car.