Bell edges Briscoe as race finishes under caution

Bell’s JBL Toyota, owned by Kyle Busch, was barely a bumper ahead of Briscoe’s Ford, owned by Brad Keselowski, when the yellow flew for a spectacular last-lap shunt, but it was enough for Bell to earn his second victory of the year. The margin of victory was a mere 0.002 seconds.

Third, fourth and fifth went to Ryan Truex, Grant Enfinger and Ben Rhodes in Toyotas, with Justin Haley finishing as top-scoring Chevrolet.

Stage 3

After the stops at the end of Stage 2, Christopher Bell restarted alongside Myatt Snider, ahead of Chase Briscoe, Johnny Sauter, John Hunter Nemechek, Ben Rhodes, Timothy Peters, Kaz Grala.

Snider couldn’t hold onto Bell at the drop of the green, but bravely held off a strong challenge from Briscoe who would soon lose his third place to Sauter, who then also passed Snider and raced onto the tail of Bell. Snider tumbled outside the Top 10 by Lap 93, as Nemechek established himself in fourth and became part of the Bell/Sauter/Briscoe battle. Grala was fifth some 1.5sec adrift., less than 10 laps after the restart, with Crafton in sixth ahead of Truex, Peterson, Gragson and Rhodes.

On Lap 98, Briscoe pounced on Sauter as they hit lapped traffic, and Nemechek also took advantage of Sauter’s lost momentum to snatch third. Sauter repassed Nemechek on Lap 102.

Polesitter Gragson hit pitroad on Lap 104 with a tire vibration, and as he came in he exceeded the pitspeed limit, and would have to serve a drive-through penalty. That double-whammy dropped him two laps down on the leaders.

Truex passed Crafton for fifth on Lap 116 and immediately Crafton came under intense pressure from the cluster of three trucks behind him – Grala, Rhodes and Enfinger.

On Lap 119, Canada’s Stuart Friesen stuffed his Chevrolet in the wall, after what appeared to be a puncture in the right-front tire, and the full-course yellow flew with 48 laps to go. This was inside the final pit window, and so Bell headed the leading runners to the pits. He took on only two right-side tires after changing the lefts in the previous stop, and easily escaped ahead of his opposition. Similar tactics from Justin Haley saw him leap to second, followed by Briscoe, Truex, Nemechek, Peters, Grala, Rhodes, Sauter after a poor stop, and Enfinger completing the Top 10.

The race restarted with 43 laps to go, with Briscoe beating Haley to grab second behind Bell. But six laps later, Snider’s Toyota looped into a spin and made contact with the Turn 2 wall, wiping off part of the Texas Motor Speedway logo, and scattering it onto the track.

The next restart came with 32 laps to go, and Bell held the lead through Turn 1 and only Briscoe appeared able to go with him. A lap later, Nemechek pinched Haley down through 1 and 2 as he tried to take third, but Haley’s truck bumped him and sent him hard into the wall. Out came the yellow again, with Sauter, Haley, Rhodes, Enfinger, Truex., Grala, Austin Self and Crafton rounding out the Top 10.

Now with 25 laps to go, all bets were off, as were the gloves. Bell and Briscoe completed the whole of 143 side-by-side but eventually Bell prevailed on the inside line, and Sauter, Truex and Rhodes riding close behind.

Truex passed Sauter for third with 20 to go, but Sauter showed no inclination to let the #16 truck go, as half a second ahead Briscoe continued to pressure Bell, especially as they negotiated traffic. Sauter retook Truex on lap 153 and Crafton took advantage to slide into fourth. Then the #13 truck of Cody Coughlin started belching smoke and flames, bringing out the yellow once more. Rhodes, Grala, Gragson and Peters took the opportunity to pit for fresh rubber.

With eight to go, the green flew once more, and the frontrunners behaved themselves, as Snider suffered an incident with Rhodes that collected Grala and brought out another yellow.

Briscoe had been classified as leader by 0.001sec when the yellow flew, and so at last had the inside line for the final restart with two laps to go, with Truex, Enfinger, Self, and Sauter right behind. But by the time they came back around to the start/finish line, Bell was ahead. Then the race was yellow-flagged on the final lap, as Self lost the rear of his truck, bounced off Sauter and spun down toward the infield. That collected Peters whose truck then tumbled through the grass on the front stretch, coming to a halt with Peters still upside down.

“I’m fine,” Peters told Motor Racing Network after leaving the Infield Care Center. “It sucks, really. Shane Huffmann and all the guys at MDM brought a good truck. Just trying to help them and their program — and obviously, it’s not helping them and their program by bringing home a destroyed truck. It looked like when the 22 got loose and came back in the middle of the race track. I was coming up the race track, kind of let off, then went back to the throttle and he came back in front of us.

“Thanks for everybody here that gave me the opportunity. Metabo Power Tools for coming on board. I just wanted to give them a little bit better finish than that ending. I’m fine. It’s a testament to NASCAR, everyone at MDM for building me a safe race truck. I’m fine. My pride is hurt more than anything.”

Stage 2

Johnny Sauter retained the lead following pitstops, but Christopher Bell who’d finished second in Stage 1 was dumped back to eighth after taking four tires compared with two for most of his opponents. Sauter’s nearest challengers for the restart would be Chase Briscoe, Kaz Grala, Noah Gragson, Matt Crafton and Justin Haley. John Hunter Nemechek in seventh, like Bell, took on four tires.

Crafton would fall back at the drop of the green, while Nemechek and Bell made their way forward. Meanwhile up front, Sauter kept the lead ahead of Gragson, as Briscoe started falling back. On Lap 54, Bell demoted him to fourth, and swiftly moved onto the tail of Sauter/Gragson battle. On Lap 57, Bell and Briscoe got past Bell’s teammate Gragson, and the #4 JBL Truck was just a tenth of a second behind Sauter by Lap 60. At this point Nemechek was fifth ahead of Grant Enfinger, but on Lap 67, the pair passed Gragson.

On Lap 70, Bell hit the front after Sauter started drifting up the track through Turns 1 and 2, and Briscoe tried to take advantage too. However, the #29 Ford got loose down on the white line, and Sauter held on… For a while. Finally on Lap 75 Briscoe made an inside pass stick and grabbed second. By this point he was 1.2sec adrift of Bell, however, but 3sec ahead of fourth place, currently held by Nemechek.

That’s how the stage ended – Bell, Briscoe, Sauter, Nemechek – followed by Grala, Truex, Enfinger, Gragson, Haley and Ben Rhodes.

Stage 1

Austin Cindric made it to Lap 3 before his Ford went hugely sideways and tailended the wall and brought out the yellows. At this point Noah Gragson led Matt Crafton chased by Ryan Truex, Grant Enfinger, Ben Rhodes and John Hunter Nemechek. Within three laps, Chris Bell’s JBL Toyota had already climbed from 21^st on the grid to 14^th.

But when the green flag flew, Jordan Anderson spun his Chevrolet as drivers continued to over-optimistically try to make a third lane work.

The green flag flew again on Lap 11, and this time Crafton got the jump with Truex behind him but Gragson came back at them and retook the lead on Lap 13, as Bell’s remarkable progress continued – fourth by Lap 15.

Johnny Sauter’s Chevrolet grabbed the lead from Gragson on Lap 20 and Sauter followed him through, but two laps later Crafton got caught behind a backmarker was passed by Gragson and Bell. Behind them, Truex and Enfinger dueled over fifth.

Bell took second from Gragson on Lap 25, and swiftly moved onto Sauter’s tail. Gragson kept losing places, to Crafton (again) and Enfinger and Truex.

The first stage’s 40 laps ended with Sauter still leading Bell by 0.36sec, the pair of them around 1.6sec ahead of Crafton, Enfinger, Nemechek, Chase Briscoe, Truex, Gragson, Kaz Grala and Cody Coughlin.