NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. — Fireworks lit up the sky, and smoke billowed from the tires of the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota as Christopher Bell celebrated his first victory in the NASCAR All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro Speedway.
On Sunday night, Bell climbed from his car to a standing ovation. Scratch that — virtually everyone in the packed grandstands already had been standing for the final 28 lap green-flag run, as Bell battled Joey Logano side-by-side and finally cleared last year’s winner for the lead on Lap 241 of 250.
At that point, Bell had better right-side tires than Logano, who had stayed out under the promoter’s caution signaled by unofficial flagman Michael Waltrip on Lap 215.
Bell pitted for two tires under the yellow, restarted sixth on Lap 223 behind five cars that stayed out and quickly advanced to second with a pass of Ross Chastain on Lap 227.
From that point, it was game-on for Bell, who pursued Logano relentlessly. On Lap 241, Bell pulled even with Logano, drifted out toward the wall, taking Logano with him and completed the decisive pass. His winning margin was 0.744 seconds.
“North Wilkesboro, how about that one?” Bell shouted after climbing from his car with the smoke still lingering from his celebratory burnout. “That right there is absolutely incredible. North Wilkesboro, best short track on the schedule.”
The victory was the first for a Toyota driver since JGR’s Kyle Busch took the checkered flag in 2017.
Logano, who led 199 of 200 laps in last year’s All-Star Race victory at the historic 0.625-mile short track, led a race-high 139 laps on Sunday to 28 for Bell. The driver of the No. 22 Team Penske Ford held a comfortable lead when the yellow flag for the promoter’s caution—a new wrinkle introduced by Speedway Motorsports CEO Marcus Smith — slowed the action, forced a pit stop choice and bunched the field.
“I’m pissed off right now,” Logano said. “Just dang it, we had the fastest car. The Shell-Pennzoil Mustang was so fast. You get to… I’m trying to choose my words correctly on the caution situation. Obviously, I got bit by it, so I am the one frustrated, obviously….
“I’m all about no gimmicks with the caution. I am all about that. I’m a little… me and Marcus Smith aren’t seeing eye to eye right now, OK? I’ve got to have a word with him.”
The caution and the tire disadvantage ultimately prevented Logano from winning his second straight All-Star Race and third overall.
“Thought maybe we could hold him off, but the 20 had a good enough restart, cleared too many of them too fast,” Logano said. “I couldn’t get away in time. It took me six, seven laps to get my car up and rolling again.
“I did all I could do to hold him off, and he got under me and released the brake and gave me no option. Kind of just ran me up into the wall, and if I could’ve got to him, he was going around after a move like that. I just couldn’t get back to him. Just too much to try to make up with the tire deficit.
“Just frustrated after you lead so many laps and the car is so fast and you don’t win, it hurts quite a bit.”
It hurt even more because first prize money for the exhibition race is $1 million, and second place pays a small fraction of that amount. Bell was happy to line his pockets with the lion’s share of the purse.
It was the quality of the competition, however, that excited Bell the most.
“Man, that was an amazing race,” he said. “There were so many guys up there racing for the lead. We saw two-wide, three-wide for the lead. It’s just a pleasure to race here, and especially whenever you get to drive this Mobil 1 Toyota Camry.
“These boys (the No. 20 crew) have done such a good job on this thing. I told them going into it, this was the best car we’ve had in a long time. Joey was fast. He gave us a lot of competition, and the 12 (Ryan Blaney) was really good there and the 9 (Chase Elliott). They had competitive cars. The strategy—we knew it would be all over the place and it fell our way.”
Bell acknowledged that the urgency of passing Logano in the closing run forced him to push the issue.
“He did a great job of trying to keep me behind him, and I knew that once I got that run off Turn 4, it was like alright, I’m going to have to be a little more aggressive and kind of leaned on him and got him out of position.
“I knew once I got the lead, I had the tire advantage so I should be able to cruise, and it worked out that way.”
On the same tire strategy as Logano, Chastain held third at the finish, followed by Hendrick Motorsports drivers Alex Bowman, Elliott and William Byron. Tyler Reddick, Kyle Busch, Chase Briscoe and Chris Buescher completed the top 10.
