NASCAR clarifies decision against Bell that sends Byron into the championship race

MARTINSVILLE, Va. – NASCAR officials were solely focused on whether to penalize Christopher Bell for driving against the wall on the final lap of Sunday’s elimination race at Martinsville Speedway in the roughly 25 minutes it took them to make a decision.

NASCAR ultimately penalized Bell for what it called a safety violation, dropping him from 18th to 22nd place after the race. Bell, who finished a lap behind the leaders, fell to the last car among those going a lap down. This allowed William Byron to secure the final spot in next weekend’s championship race at Phoenix Raceway, joining Joey Logano, Tyler Reddick and Martinsville Winner Ryan Blaney.

Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s senior vice president of competition, said officials did not focus, however, on the Chevrolet cars of Ross Chastain and Austin Dillon, running side-by-side behind Byron’s Chevrolet, who could not afford to lose another position in the standings in the final laps. The stewards also took no time to address the issue of Bubba Wallace’s Toyota slowing down on the final lap, which allowed Bell’s Toyota to pass and seemingly gain the point needed to advance.

“If you look at the other situations that happened with (Wallace) and the cars behind (Byron), it really doesn’t matter at this point,” Sawyer told reporters Sunday evening. “We’ll look at these later.

“But when you analyze exactly what happened, you look at the situation with (Bell) and the fence, and then the riding on the fence, which we clearly stated in our statement after Ross (Chastain) did it (in 2022). that it will not be accepted.”

NASCAR announced on February 1, 2023 that it was banning the “Hail Melon” move made by Chastain as he hit the wall in Turns 3 and 4 during the final lap of the 2022 Martinsville playoff race. Chastain used this desperate move to gain five places and take the final spot in the title race with Denny Hamlin.

NASCAR said at the time that it was not adding the rule, but noted the portion of the rule book that included it.

Section 10.5.2.5.A of the Cup Rules reads: “Safety is the highest priority for NASCAR and NEM. Therefore, any violations deemed to jeopardize the safety of the Competition or otherwise pose a dangerous risk to the safety of Competitors, Officials, spectators or others are treated with the utmost seriousness. Security breaches will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis.”

Wallace slowed on the final lap and Bell passed Wallace entering Turn 3. Bell drove up to the wall and rode along the SAFER barrier from the middle of the turn through Turn 4 before exiting it on the front stretch.

After the race, Wallace told reporters, “I got loose or something broke, so I was nursing it, and then (Bell) tried to slide me off.” I say, “brother.” I’m just trying to wait for time, not crash, be careful and not confuse the whole field.

Bell defended his actions of riding against the wall.

“My options are to slide into the wall or fall out,” Bell told NBC Sports. “I can’t turn around, so I slumped against the wall.”

As for the time until the results are announced, Sawyer said: “First and foremost, we want everything to be right. It’s not something that happens every week. We want to be prepared.

“I thought our tower team did exactly what they had to do. Let’s fix it.

“Luckily we don’t have this every week. We will definitely revisit this decision and consider whether we could have made this decision sooner. I didn’t know it lasted. You could have told me it took five minutes or 55. I don’t know.