“That would be perfectly fine” - Christopher Bell makes his feelings known to Dale Jr. about NASCAR tire preference

Christopher Bell, the 2025 Phoenix Raceway Cup Series race winner, recently offered his insights on the new softer option tires adopted by NASCAR for the race. Bell also inclined towards NASCAR using the option tires as primary tires in the future.

Christopher Bell, driving the #20 for Joe Gibbs Racing, has had a tremendous start to the season, etching 3 victories in a row, all on different tracks. At the latest Shriners Children's, Bell started in 11th and dominated the race, leading a total of 105 laps. Bell edged out his JGR teammate Denny Hamlin by a mere 0.049 seconds. This is the first time a driver has secured three consecutive wins in the NextGen car, marking a significant achievement for the 30-year-old.

One of the biggest talking points from the race was the use of tire management. Teams were given access to two sets of optional tires along with the primary harder tires. The softer tires provided easy handling and, thus, more pace around the corners. Bell and his crew utilized the softer tires in the final laps, maintaining the lead and crossing the checkered flag.

On Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s podcast, Dale Jr. Download, Christopher Bell offered his thoughts on the use of option tires in NASCAR. Bell backed the usage of option tires as the primary tires because he believed that the harder tire is at a disadvantage, with the softer tires offering the drivers better handling of their cars.

"If they want to run the option tire as the primary tire, I think that would be, you know, perfectly fine. What I don't like is having two tire compound options, which are limited use, and one compound is a significant advantage of the other one," Christopher Bell said.

Bell offered his views on the advantage that the softer tires are offering on road courses. He continued,

"I mean, we saw probably the best road course race we've had in a long time with that new tire, and I think that red tire that we had at Phoenix is certainly where we need to be. It gave the race cars a ton more feel, and you're able to slide the car around more."

"So, yes, I wholeheartedly agree that we need to keep going down this path of getting softer tires, making the car drive where you can drive it hard and step over the limit and not crash each other, but having two compounds in one race makes it tough," he added.

This was the third consecutive win for Christopher Bell, coming after wins at Atlanta Motor Speedway and Circuit of the Americas.

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Joe Gibbs struggles to explain Christopher Bell’s sudden three-race winning streak

After Phoenix Raceway triumph, Joe Gibbs, the NASCAR champion car owner, struggled to explain Christopher Bell's sudden three-race winning streak. While answering a question raised by FOX Motorsports reporter Bob Pockrass, Gibbs admitted that he doesn't know how Bell went from not winning in his last 19 races to winning three in a row.

"I don't know. I gotta tell you the truth. I don't know if I have an answer for that," Gibbs said (0:08 onwards).

With three wins, Bell matched his career-high for wins in a single season in just four races in 2025.