Christopher Bell radio audio adds to race manipulation controversy at Martinsville

NASCAR is currently in the process of determining if any race manipulation took place involving Christopher Bell, William Byron and several other drivers during the closing laps of Sunday’s Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway.

Bell, in particular, made a last lap pass on fellow Toyota driver Bubba Wallace to secure at the time his spot in the Championship 4 at Phoenix next Sunday. Wallace ran 2.4 seconds slower than Bell on the final lap, appearing to slow up to allow Bell to catch up and go by him. Wallace claimed he “got loose or something broke.”

Davey Segal of SiriusXM NASCAR Radio released the transcript from Bell and his No. 20 team’s radio audio. At one point, Bell’s crew chief, Adam Stevens, said, “We’ve been telling him to back up to us. We need one [spot], we need to catch that No. 23 [Wallace].”

“Watch the No. 23, that’s a spot. 23’s a spot, he’s got a problem,” spotter Stevie Reeves said before Bell passed Wallace.

After Bell passed Wallace, Stevens said, “I think we’re in, buddy. We’ll see.”

NASCAR’s Elton Sawyer weighs in on teaming, collusion after controversial Martinsville finish involving Christopher Bell

Wallace isn’t the only driver under investigation from NASCAR. Austin Dillon and Ross Chastain formed a blockade behind Byron in the closing laps, as if a driver passed him, he would be below Bell in points. Both Chastain and Dillon are Chevrolet drivers, and it’s clear based on their radio audio they were well aware of what was at stake for Byron, also a Chevrolet driver.

“24 is one to the good, one point to the good,” said Chastain’s spotter, Brandon McReynolds.

“Does the 1 team know the deal,” said Dillon’s spotter, Brandon Benesch. “Yeah, he should,” was the response from crew chief Justin Alexander.

Bell was issued a safety violation 27 minutes after the race for riding the wall to advance past Wallace. Riding the wall became a safety violation after Chastain’s “Hail Melon” at Martinsville two years ago. That eliminated Bell from the playoffs and put Byron into the Championship 4.

NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer said the possible race manipulation from multiple drivers played no role in the decision to penalize Bell.

“If you look at the other situations, the 23 [Wallace] [and] the cars behind the 24 [Byron], really no bearing at this time,” Sawyer said. “We’ll look at those at a later time. But when you really just [look at] exactly what happened, look at the 20 [Bell] getting up against the fence and then riding the fence, which as we clearly stated in our statement after Ross did that, that would not be accepted.”