Recap Christopher Bell’s 2021 season that saw him win the second race of the season and make the playoffs for the first time.
Editor‘s Note: This continues the series of season reviews for the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs drivers.
Driver: Christopher Bell
Car: No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Camry
Crew chief: Adam Stevens
Final 2021 ranking: 12th
Key stats: 1 win, 7 top fives, 16 top 10s, 100 laps led
How 2021 ended:
Bell’s playoff run came to an early end after a Round of 12 elimination, but the second-year driver earned three top fives and six top 10s over the season‘s final 10 races, ending the season with a ninth-place effort at Phoenix Raceway.
Best race:
The Daytona International Speedway Road Course will forever hold a special place in Christopher Bell‘s heart as he wheeled the No. 20 Toyota to the track‘s storied Victory Lane in the second race of the 2021 season.
Bell passed Kurt Busch for second place with five laps to go and proceeded to erase Joey Logano‘s 3.5-second lead before passing him for his first career Cup Series victory coming to the white flag.
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Additional highlights:
• Bell‘s year was scattered with impressive runs. A runner-up at the series‘ inaugural race at Road America further proved Bell‘s road-course prowess, as did a rally to seventh place at Watkins Glen International after a scuffle with Kyle Larson for second went awry.
• Bell was also reeling in Aric Almirola in the waning moments at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in July but the threat of darkness erased the final eight laps of the contest, relegating Bell to second.
• Third-place results at Richmond Raceway and Texas Motor Speedway in the Playoffs helped cap a successful sophomore season.
Stat to know:
Transferring from the previously Toyota-aligned but now-defunct Leavine Family Racing team to in-house at Joe Gibbs Racing for 2021, Bell posted quite notable jumps in both top fives and top 10s from his rookie year. After notching two top fives and seven top 10s in 2020, Bell wheeled the No. 20 car to seven top fives and 16 top 10s in addition to earning his first career win. Those 16 top-10 results equate to finishing inside the top 10 44.4% of the season.
Quotable:
“On-track incident? Whatever. Him [Kyle Larson] crying to the media that I didn‘t reply to his sorry text message, like come on.” — Bell after his summer feud with Larson after Watkins Glen
RELATED: Christopher Bell on Kyle Larson: ‘We haven’t communicated’
Looking ahead:
The 2021 season brought Bell his first career playoff appearance, but he was unable to get to past the Round of 12. Next season marks the start of a new era with the Next Gen car, but JGR‘s reputation as a perennial title contender certainly means high expectations on the young driver. With six top 10s in the final 10 races of 2021, the mindset from Bell and his team must be pointed on making a run into the Round of 8 in 2022.