Bell credits safety advances for enabling him to race at Pocono

Christopher Bell will essentially be driving with one hand this weekend at Pocono Raceway as he begins taking on the challenge of racing with a fractured wrist. But he at least gets to race one week after taking the hardest hit in the Next Gen era.

“The car did absolutely perfect and all my safety gear did absolutely perfect,” Bell said Saturday. “And that’s why I’m back in the car this week.”

A fractured wrist is all that Bell was left with after hitting the outside wall at Michigan International Speedway when Chase Elliott got loose underneath him and collided with his driver’s side door. It instantly shot his Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota up the racetrack and into the wall. Then Bell was hit again, in the door, when Elliott’s car headed toward the outside wall.

“I was still hands on the wheel, hands turned left, and then my left hand, which was on the bottom, my wrist was bent over on the underside of the wheel,” described Bell of how the injury might have happened. “Just the force into the steering wheel slightly smashed it. So, that was that.”

Elliott took responsibility for the incident and repeatedly checked on Bell during the week. Bell thought it was a racing accident, but wouldn’t even go as far as to say it was hard racing.

Bell has a cast on his left wrist. It has been molded as much as possible to his steering wheel, and the wheel is also a bit different, courtesy of MPI (Max Papis Innovations). To accommodate the extra material in Bell’s palm from the cast, the steering wheel was modified by removing some material on that side to improve his grip.

“I’m going to have to acclimate to driving primarily right-handed,” Bell said. “I think I drove primarily left-handed under normal circumstances, so it’s going to take a little bit of acclimation for sure.”

NASCAR will not be releasing the data around the crash, other than to confirm it was the hardest tin the Next Gen era. One of the safety officials, Matt Harper, the managing director of safety systems, also said it was the hardest hit he has seen since joining NASCAR in 2015.

Bell is not sure what the numbers are and didn’t get that much into the weeds on it. It would be his choice or Joe Gibbs Racing to release the information.

“Honestly, I don’t really know,” Bell said. “I’ve been told it’s 63Gs on impact, but I don’t know what the Delta-v is, and honestly, it doesn’t matter to me. It was a big one, but I’m so, so incredibly fortunate and thankful and blessed that my head was OK, and to get out of there with just a fractured wrist is pretty immaculate. I owe all the credit to NASCAR and my team for building safe cars.

“I know I said it in my statement earlier (this week), but all of the previous drivers who have paid somewhat of a price to make these cars as safe as they are today, NASCAR learning from every experience they’ve had and every moment and every crash, it all paid off last Sunday. I’m super grateful, and I’m looking forward to putting it behind me for sure.”

The plan is for Bell to run all 400 miles on Sunday at Pocono. However, if he can’t, then fellow Gibbs driver Brandon Jones will be on standby. He acknowledged it could be a week-to-week decision-making process.