BRISTOL, Tenn. — With a charge to the lead from fifth place with four laps left in Saturday‘s Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway, Christopher Bell kept Joe Gibbs Racing and Toyota perfect in the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs.
Bell survived a hard, square shot to his rear bumper from Brad Keselowski in the final corner and steered straight to the finish line, 0.343 seconds ahead of the Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing co-owner and driver.
Joining JGR teammates Chase Briscoe and Denny Hamlin as winners in the Round of 16, Bell advanced to the Round of 12, which begins Sept. 21 at one of his best tracks, New Hampshire Motor Speedway (2 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App).
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The race marked the end of the playoffs for the four drivers who came to “Thunder Valley” below the elimination line — Alex Bowman, Austin Dillon, Shane van Gisbergen and Josh Berry.
Of the four, only Bowman made a significant charge, finishing 10 points below Austin Cindric, the final Round of 12 qualifier.
Six days after complaining bitterly about strategy in a seventh-place finish at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, Bell was back on top, scoring his fourth victory of the season, his first at Bristol and the 13th of his career.
On fresh right-side tires after a pit stop on Lap 491, the driver of No. 20 Camry took the lead from fifth on Lap 497 of 500 and kept Keselowski, on four new tires, at bay for the duration, even though Keselowski got to Bell‘s rear bumper on the final circuit.
With new, softer right-side tires supplied by Goodyear for the race, the extent of tire wear was a shock to the drivers and crew chiefs.
“Well, I’ll tell you what, I was nervous on the two (tires),” Bell said. “I didn’t know if I wanted to be on the bottom or the top, and whenever Brad picked the top (lane) didn’t really give me an option. I had to pick the bottom.
“All night long, I don’t know, old tires just really, really pushed up in the middle of the corners, so I was hoping that those guys (starting ahead of him) on old tires would push up, and they did. They did, and I was able to get by or get underneath them.
“It wasn’t pretty there at the end, but we got her done.”
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Keselowski rued his pick of the top lane for the final restart.
“Just the story of our season, just a 50/50 shot on the restart and I got the lane that couldn’t launch,” Keselowski said. “Just frustrating. We had a great car, great strategy, put ourselves in position to, if not win, at least have a really, really solid day, and on that last restart, (we) just rolled the dice and didn’t get anything good.”
Bell‘s teammate, Ty Gibbs, led a race-high 201 laps, but overshot pit road on the last green-flag stop and finished 10th. Briscoe was out front for 127 laps and finished ninth after a late green-flag stop for fresh tires.
Non-playoff driver Zane Smith ran third, followed by Team Penske title contenders Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano. Part-timer Corey Heim scored a career-best sixth, followed by non-playoff driver Carson Hocevar and Bowman.
For practical purposes, most of the Round of 16 eliminations were settled early. On Lap 75, Josh Berry brought his No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford to pit road with smoke from the right-front wheel well filling the cockpit.
Berry climbed from the car, finishing last for the third straight event, out of the race and out of the playoffs.
“It‘s hard to put into words, but I‘d be way more disappointed if we just ran like crap for three weeks,” said Berry, who had qualified 10th and moved forward from his starting spot. “We‘ve been up front. We‘ve qualified well. We had the issue at Darlington, bottoming out. Last week, we got clipped by the 9 (Chase Elliott), and then tonight the car catches on fire…
“Honestly, I think the way that was playing out, we would have 100 percent had a chance to win tonight.”
By the time Berry exited, Austin Dillon, who entered the race 11 points below the cutline, already had experienced severe cording of his right-side tires. Dillon pitted on Lap 28 and compounded his issues with a pit-road speeding penalty.
Dillon was 30th at the end of Stage 1, the last driver one lap down, with little hope of remaining in the playoffs. By the end of Stage 2, he was two laps down in 33rd. Dillon finished 28th, missing the Round of 12 by 14 points.
Shane van Gisbergen, 15 points down at the start of the race, steadily lost ground throughout the first two stages. The final blow for the New Zealander was a spin in Turn 4 after a bump from William Byron.
Another spin and a 26th-place finish left the Sunoco rookie 16 points behind Cindric in his first trip to the postseason.
SHOP: Christopher Bell winner gear
Of the drivers who started below the cutline, only Bowman mounted a concerted threat. Recovering from a spin on Lap 100, the driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet surged forward on new tires and finished third behind Gibbs and Ryan Blaney in Stage 2.
Bowman had come to Bristol 35 points down, but with the eight points he collected in the second stage, he moved to 11 points behind Ross Chastain for the final transfer spot into the Round of 12 for the start of the final stage.
Chastain recovered a lost lap and finished 19th, preserving his berth in the Round of 12, but Cindric had a close call when his right-front wheel well started spewing flames on Lap 457. Cindric lost five laps on pit road, as Bowman closed with a point of the transfer spot, but the gap widened in the closing laps.
Chase Elliott crashed on Lap 311 after contact with John Hunter Nemechek‘s Toyota and finished 38th, but the Hendrick driver had enough of a cushion to move on to the Round of 12.
Other drivers advancing to the next playoff round on points were Blaney, William Byron, Kyle Larson, Bubba Wallace, Tyler Reddick and Logano.
NOTE: Post-race inspection in the Cup Series garage concluded without issue, confirming Bell as the winner. No cars will return to the NASCAR R&D Center in Concord, North Carolina.
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