Bell to be evaluated for potential injuries after Michigan crash

Joe Gibbs said Christopher Bell will be evaluated for potential wrist and ankle injuries upon returning to North Carolina.

Bell took a hard hit to the outside wall on lap 148 of Sunday’s race at Michigan International Speedway. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time when Chase Elliott got loose underneath him and bounced off the side of his car. The contact immediately sent Bell’s car into the outside wall at a high rate of speed, and Elliott’s car followed, and the two vehicles bounced off each other again.

“We’re going to continue tonight when he gets home, going to make sure he gets everything he needs to get there,” said Gibbs. “Whatever it might be. Then we’ll have to kind of wait. It’s his wrist and his ankle, I think. We’re just going to have to wait.”

Bell and Elliott climbed from their cars under their own power and were seen and released from the infield care center. However, Bell did not speak to the media.

The incident resulted in a red flag for NASCAR to make repairs to the wall and SAFER barrier.

“I’m fine,” Elliott said. “It was totally my fault. I feel really bad for Bell and just taking him out. I was just trying to run in the bottom and kind of make use of our fresh tires and try and at least get to second, I was hoping. Or, hopefully, even stay side by side with him. But I got in there and got free and thought I was going to spin, and was kind of committing to spinning out, and as soon as I started to commit to spinning, it just hooked up and hooked a right and unfortunately sent Christopher into the wall super hard and me shortly there behind.

"Just racing really hard; I feel like that was kind of a turning point in the race. We needed to make something happen and stepped over the line again and paid for it.”