Christopher Bell emerged as the winner of another wild overtime finish at Atlanta Motor Speedway Sunday, as he dueled with Carson Hocevar and Kyle Larson in the closing lap of the Ambetter Health 400.
As the trio of lead cars spread out three-wide half way through the white flag lap, the final caution of the race flew when Josh Berry’s car slammed into the wall back in the pack. Berry won Stage 1 in his No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford and ran in the front most of the night.
As NASCAR hit the caution button, Bell was in the lead at the time and was declared the winner in his No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota.
It was the only lap that Bell led in the race after starting 32nd. He was one of 15 different leaders for a track-record 50 lead changes.
Bell was half-a-car-length ahead of Hocevar and Larson was a couple more inches back as they were charging to the checkered flag.
The win is the first Cup Series victory for Bell on a superspeedway, his first win of the season and 10th win of his career.
“This place is just bonkers and every time we come here it gets wilder and wilder,” Bell said. “It can be risky to be on the top or bottom. You can pick wrong either way. First half of the race I couldn’t do anything right. We kept working on it and then these boys got it tuned up.”
The drama started to unfold as the field charged around the track with four laps to go. As the cars up front shuffled around, Austin Cindric’s machine grazed the outside wall and slid to his left where he made contact with Daytona 500 winner William Byron, who was positioning himself behind teammate Larson to begin pushing him. The two cars careened down the track and brought out a caution to set up the green, white, checker finish.
Larson and Bell were lined up side by side on the final restart and Hocevar, pole winner Ryan Blaney, and Ross Chastain were also in the mix. Bell was in the right place at the right time when caution waved on the white flag lap.
“That right there is what you dream of to restart on the first or second row of a superspeedway race,” Bell said. “I love superspeedways. This style of racing has been a struggle for me. Adam (Stevens, crew chief) and the boys had this car tuned up and I just had to hold my foot to the floor and that’s how you like it. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought I would win a superspeedway race.”
Larson, who won stage two and has also had his struggles with superspeedways, will remain winless on them, but he will take his third-place finish. It’s his third top-five at Atlanta after posting five recent finishes in the 30th place spot or worse.
"Bummer not to get a win,” Larson said. “I’m proud of the effort today by this No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevy team. We had a lot of fun. It was super intense. It was my first legit finish here at Atlanta Motor Speedway since the reconfiguration, so I’ll take it. I feel like we learned a lot and I feel like we can be a lot better with the balance of our racecar to be a little bit more on offense while we are in traffic. We just came up a little bit short. Congratulations to Bell."
Last year’s Cup Rookie of the Year Hocevar was aggressive in the overtime period and several drivers spoke to him after the race. He says he is still learning but was thrilled to be in the mix at the end.
“Apologies to Larson and Mr. H (Rick Hendrick, team owner),” Hocevar said. “I didn’t realize we weren’t racing back to the line. A little longer and maybe we win the race. I normally ride in the back and run last and try to get a decent finish. There’s some stuff I have to learn and clean up a little bit. We put ourselves in a good position to win a race tonight and I’ve never done that before, especially in a superspeedway race.”
Local favorite Chase Elliott saw his chances of winning his hometown race go away after his No. 9 Chevy got caught up in a caution late in Stage 2 around lap 150. He and Brad Keselowski, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., and Corey LaJoie were among the drivers involved in that incident.
Defending winner Daniel Suárez’s quest to repeat his victory here from last spring ended when his No. 99 Trackhouse Racing Chevy was involved in a crash with Noah Gragson, Cole Custer, Ty Gibbs, and Todd Gilliland on lap 185.
Of the notables who were involved in cautions, their final finish spots included 20th place Elliott, 25th place Berry, Byron at 27th, Cindric at 28th and Keselowski at 39th.
Joey Logano led the most laps at 83 but finished 12th in his No. 22 Team Penske Ford.
Blaney finished fourth and was followed by Stenhouse, Denny Hamlin, Saturday truck winner Kyle Busch, Chastain, Bubba Wallace and John Hunter Nemechek in the top 10.
Ambetter Health 400 NASCAR Cup Series results Sunday from Atlanta Motor Speedway:
- Christopher Bell
- Carson Hocevar
- Kyle Larson
- Ryan Blaney
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
- Denny Hamlin
- Kyle Busch
- Ross Chastain
- Bubba Wallace
- Hunter Nemechek
- Zane Smith
- Joey Logano
- Michael McDowell
- AJ Allmendinger
- Todd Gilliland
- Austin Dillon
- Riley Herbst
- Ryan Preece
- Tyler Reddick
- Chase Elliott
- Chase Briscoe
- BJ McLeod
- Van Gisbergen
- Justin Haley
- Josh Berry
- Alex Bowman
- William Byron
- Austin Cindric
- Ty Dillon
- Chris Buescher
- Erik Jones
- Ty Gibbs
- Daniel Suarez
- Noah Gragson
- Cody Ware
- Cole Custer
- JJ Yeley
- Corey LaJoie
- Brad Keselowski
