February 5, 2021 | By Lee Spencer

Christopher Bell begins again with Joe Gibbs Racing

In November, Christopher Bell ended his rookie season in the NASCAR Cup Series. Now he's starting over again.

Coming off of a less than remarkable season with a lame-duck team, Bell returns home to Joe Gibbs Racing under the direction of veteran crew chief Adam Stevens, who led Kyle Busch to championships in 2015 and 2019.

While Bell could operate under the radar while he was behind the wheel of the No. 95 Leavine Family Racing Toyota last year, the 26-year-old sophomore won’t have that luxury at JGR.

“It’s tough,” Bell said. “I’m in a difficult position, no doubt about it. Whenever you drive for Joe Gibbs Racing or any top organization, I think that the expectations are to be a championship contender. Coach (Joe Gibbs) provides all of the resources needed to have four championship-caliber teams, and that's what the goal is. Anything short of that is not good enough. 

“This is my first year here. I don’t think that people are realistically expecting me to compete for a championship this first year, but eventually, that needs to be the end goal – to have a championship-caliber team, and I hope that I’m a championship-caliber driver to lead that group.”

Luckily for Bell, he’s a quick study. The 2013 USAC National Midget champion has excelled while rising through the NASCAR ranks—winning in his third start in a truck, his first time in an ARCA Menards car and in his fifth Xfinity Series start. 

Bell credits his dirt background with expediting his learning curve. But it couldn’t prepare him for the 400- and 500-mile marathons in stock car’s top tour.

“Dirt racing really made me good at raw speed, and it seems like going fast really hasn’t been my issue,” Bell said. “But one thing with my style of dirt racing that I did, it didn’t prepare me for distance races. That’s been the hardest part each step of the way, whether that’s late models, then moving into Trucks, and then moving into Xfinity. The races have just gotten longer and longer and longer.”

For Bell, that proved to be another challenge during his freshman season in Cup. The longer races provided more opportunities for Bell to find trouble. Going the distance is an aspect of his program Bell looks to improve on in 2021.

“The Cup races are sometimes twice the length of the Xfinity races,” Bell said. “The distance part is a big difference, and learning how to run all of those miles without making one mistake and getting into the wall and knocking the fender into the tire, cutting a tire, and getting into somebody—gaining that knowledge and experience. 

“If we are on lap 200 of 325, you don’t need to push extra to get 10th spot or whatever. The distance part has been the difficult part, making sure you can compete 500-mile races and have a car that’s in one piece. I haven’t done a great job of that through the course of last year and I’ve got to make sure I’m seeing the checkered flags with all of my fenders on the car. I’m really focused on limiting my mistakes this year, making sure I have a clean car at the end of the race.”

With Stevens, Gibbs aligned Bell with its most senior—and successful—crew chief to help the young driver in his transition. The 42-year-old Portsmouth, Ohioan collected two championships and 28 wins atop the box for Kyle Busch. Bell spent the offseason getting acquainted with the new leader of the No. 20 team.

“I’d say we have spent a decent amount of time together,” Bell said. “It’s crazy when we started meeting in November and December, it was like what is your family about, how many kids do you have, where did you grow up, and now, all of a sudden, the conversations have transitioned to what is going to happen in Daytona, how do you like your cars, shift lights, and all of these other racing terms. 

“Everything was definitely getting to know him at the end of last year, and now it’s more business stuff. I feel like we have built a decent relationship—from a personal standpoint we’ve built that relationship, but now from a business standpoint, we are going to have to get on track. I’m going to have to hear him over the radio, and he is going to have to listen to my feedback over the radio and see how that goes.”

Bell could only muster two top fives and seven top 10s in his rookie season with LFR. But in his new ride, and with Stevens at the helm, Bell believes it’s a realistic expectation to contend for wins out of the box. 

“I do think that there is not a reason out there that I can’t compete for wins at Daytona, Daytona Road Course, Homestead,” Bell said. “I think that we have all of the ingredients that we need to compete for wins right out of the gate, but on the flip side, I’m definitely not going to be driving it 100-percent to win those races. 

“Last year, I got buried in points by not having a good opening stretch of races, and that is our number one goal—to see the checkered flags, get to the end whether that is 10th, 15th, fifth— anywhere. Just to see the checkered flags and not make mistakes that cost us finishes. 

“Adam has been really good about pushing that we need to build a foundation before we just go out here and start trying for wins. I think we have all the tools we need to win really early, but on the flip side, I don’t want to make a mistake trying to win too early. I would like to collect some good finishes and build on that, and then compete for wins.”