Christopher Bell took the victory at Phoenix International Raceway for Joe Gibbs Racing.
Bell’s victory capped off a dominant day for the Toyotas, who occupied the majority of the top five for much of the race. Bell was the best of the Toyota bunch for most of the day, at times running lap times multiple tenths quicker than anyone else in the field.
Aside from Bell’s victory, the final results fail to represent the strength Toyota had. Erik Jones was running strong throughout the race for Legacy Motor Club, but got in the wall late. Jones went on to finish outside the top 30.
Denny Hamlin and Tyler Reddick had been battling for the lead in the final stage, until both of their days unraveled. Hamlin spun during his battle with Reddick, and had to work his way through the pack for the remainder of the race. Reddick got mired back in traffic after the Hamlin incident. Those drivers finished tenth and eleventh, respectively.
The Fords took advantage of Toyota’s misfortune. RFK Racing brought their two cars home in second and fourth. Ryan Blaney, Michael McDowell, and Chase Briscoe also earned solid top ten finishes for their teams.
Meanwhile, Chevy failed to make an impression throughout the race. Ross Chastain was the only Chevy to finish in the top ten with a sixth place finish.
There were multiple incidents throughout the race. A crash on lap seven took Austin Dillon and Austin Cindric out of contention. For Dillon, it is the third time in four races he has gotten caught up in a wreck within the first ten laps.
It was clean running for the rest of the first two stages, but things got messy in stage three. Kyle Busch, Joey Logano, John Hunter Nemechek, Josh Berry, Corey Lajoie, Derek Kraus and Zane Smith all were caught up in an incident in the third stage.
Some cars stayed out and others pitted under these cautions, resulting in a 90 lap dash to the finish. Bell was one of the cars that pitted, and he worked his way through the field to take the comfortable victory.
“Credit to my engineers, crew chief, all the mechanics on this thing,” Bell said. “You don’t get cars like that very often.”
The next race on the calendar is at Bristol Motor Speedway. This race is a special one, as NASCAR returns to racing on Bristol’s concrete for the spring race. Since 2021, the Bristol spring race had been taking place on dirt. This return to normalcy is much anticipated by the teams, drivers, and fans.
Image courtesy of NASCAR.com
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