Christopher Bell Wins In Atlanta (2-23-25)
By: Becca Cottingham Quimby
All Photo Credit: USA Today
We head to Atlanta Motor Speedway where we will see everything we saw in Daytona but on a smaller track and one that is not as wide. Ryan Blaney took us to the green flag and it did not take long for Austin Cindric to take over. For a little bit, they were single file but then they started organizing a second line and even a third line. Josh Berry was able to get around Austin Cindric and is leading the race. The issue is if your line does not keep momentum you have to quickly find a spot to get into or you free fall through the pack. Josh Berry will hold off everyone and win stage one.
We get back to race in stage two with Joey Logano brings everyone back to green. The stage break gave Michael McDowell a chance to change a power steering pump hose. About twenty laps into stage two Ty Dillon has a right rear go down and brings out the first caution for cause. We are not back racing long before Erik Jones spins out in front of several cars. He will get towed to the garage for the team to work on the car. This will be an extensive repair for the team. Ty Dillon makes his return to the track and he has three laps to get up to minimum speed. Erik Jones will also make his way back onto the track to make minimum speed. Then we see Todd Gilliland blow a tire but manages to get his car to the pits but not before the outside of the tire ends on the track. Thinking maybe this would be the final caution but that was not the end. Chase Elliott had someone get into him and send him into the wall, which broke a right rear toe link. This then caused Brad Keselowski to end up involved and that caused him a blown radiator. From there we get a shootout to the finish with Alex Bowman and Kyle Larson. Joey Logano gave a huge shove to Alex Bowman and they went three wide. This allowed Kyle Larson on the high side the proper momentum. This allows Kyle Larson to win stage two.
We start the final stage almost three wide and sometimes even try to go four wide. They go three wide about six to seven rows deep. There is no way that with this pace with the cars, this wide for them to stay like this. They do not stay like this long at all before a wreck happens. Multiple cars: Daniel Suarez, Cole Cluster, Ty Gibbs, Noah Gragson, and JJ Yeley just to name a few. We get back under the green flag with almost the same setup with everyone. This same setup resulted in the same issue of Chris Buescher, Alex Bowman, and Ty Gibbs wrapped up in a wreck. Alex Bowman did get back out on the track and Chris Buescher did. We did see a single car spin out with Ryan Blaney after an off-center shove from Carson. They drive until almost five laps to go and we have another wreck as we run out of the racing room. Both William Byron and Austin Cindric end up in the wall. This will send us into overtime. Overtime set us up for plenty of excitement and action. With the sprint to the finish, we quickly see that it will not be smooth. Caution will come out just before the very end of the last lap of the race due to a crash. Which was about to lead to another three-way sprint to the finish. Christopher Bell was ahead at the time of caution and became the unofficial winner until the tech was complete.
