LONG POND, Pa. (AP) — Christopher Bell will race at Pocono and possibly the next month or so with a cast on his left wrist.
Bell sustained “a normal broken bone” that didn’t require surgery during a hit at Michigan International Speedway last week. Bell kept both hands on the wheel during the crash with Chase Elliott and “slightly smashed” his left hand during an impact that registered 69 Gs.
“Right now, I’m pretty much driving the car one-handed,”
Bell said Saturday.
Doctors expect Bell to fully recover in six weeks. He has enough mobility in the cast to maneuver Pocono, nicknamed the “Tricky Triangle,” but could face tougher tests over the next two weekends with consecutive road-course races in San Diego and Sonoma, California.
“I hope for more healing before we get to those tracks for sure,” he said.
As for Pocono, Bell plans to be behind the wheel for all 400 miles Sunday. Nonetheless, Brandon Jones will be on standby if Bell has problems. Jones sat through simulator sessions earlier this week to get up to speed in the No. 20 Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing.
“It’s either going to be I’m going to commit to the race and I’m going to do it, or I’m going to just start and ride around until the first yellow,” said Bell, who hadn’t gotten behind the wheel until practice Saturday. “But, as of right now, I’m full commit planning on running 400 miles.”
Bell’s cast was molded to better fit around the steering wheel, and his team “took a lot of material off of the left side of the wheel just to make it skinnier,” Bell said.
“I feel like we’re as ready as we can get and see what happens,” he added.
Bell remembers every detail of the accident despite a jarring hit that dislodged a SAFER barrier and caused a 20-minute red flag for repairs.
“Once I hit the wall, my earpiece popped out, so I scared the crap out of my wife and probably everyone else listening because I didn’t respond to (my spotter) whenever he was checking on me,” Bell said. “But my ear deal popped out, so I didn’t have any communication.”
Also concerning: His car was on fire.
“I was trying to get out as quick as I could,” he said. “I knew my wrist was broke right away because I couldn’t disconnect my shirt. I reached down, tried to disconnect my shirt and I couldn’t squeeze the button, so I had to use my right hand to do that.”
He also injured a foot, but X-rays were negative. His foot ended up just being badly bruised.
“I knew right away that my head was OK because I didn’t have any sort of headache, didn’t black out,” Bell said. “I remembered everything. … Just super, super blessed that I didn’t hit my noggin and glad I can continue on.”
Denny Hamlin will try to deliver the second three-peat of the NASCAR season – and at the track where he’s enjoyed his most success.
Hamlin won the last two races, at Michigan and Nashville, and three of the last four. No one would be surprised to see him make it three in a row and four of five at Pocono, where he has seven career Cup Series victories and a staggering 24 top-10 finishes in 36 starts.
He said Saturday that his confidence is at an all-time high.
“I feel very confident in the way that I’m approaching each racetrack, the way that I need to get speed out of the cars, what I need out of them in traffic, all those things," he said. "I feel pretty dialed in with that right now.”
In NASCAR’s modern era (1972-present), there have been 30 instances of a driver winning at least three races in a row. Of those, the driver who accomplished the streak has won the series championship 12 times.
Fellow 23XI driver Tyler Reddick won the first three races of the season. If Hamlin wins Sunday, the series would have two three-peat winners in the same season for the first time since 2018.
The start time for Sunday’s race was moved up two hours because of inclement weather in the forecast. Instead of a 3 p.m. EDT start, the green flag will drop shortly after 1 p.m.
Hamlin is the consensus betting favorite at plus-260 to win the race, the Great American Getaway 400. Reddick is the second choice at plus-625, followed by Bell (plus-825) and Kyle Larson (plus-850).
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