Christopher Bell has four wins this season, and he has an opportunity to reach five at possibly his best track. Yet, his focus remains on a critical area where his team must improve to be true championship contenders.
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They have to start races further forward so they can pursue stage points.
"What we have to do better, is we've got to start qualifying better," Bell said Saturday morning at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. "That is mission critical. Oh, my goodness. All of us are — we're frustrated a little bit of how we've qualifying especially compared to our team cars.
"I say that because the team cars are the barometer. If the team cars are qualifying well, then you should be qualifying well too. And, through the summer months, we couldn't even put it in the top 10. We've made gains on our qualifying performance and now it seems like we can consistently put it in the top 10, but our teammates are consistently putting it on the front row."
Bell's average starting position through 29 races this season is 13.5. This is his worst mark since joining Joe Gibbs Racing in 2021. The only season he had a worse average starting position was 2020 when he drove for Leavine Family Racing as a rookie.
Bell only has one pole win this season — the Martinsville spring race. He only started inside the top 10 six times in the first 18 races of the season. He has improved on these numbers with seven top-10 starts in the last 11 races, but he has yet to contend for another pole win.
This is something Bell says must change as he enters the Round of 12 race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
"Whenever you get deeper into the Playoffs, you have to be scoring stage points, and a lot of the stage points are dictated by your qualifying effort," Bell said. "So, yeah, that's mission critical. We've got to start qualifying better, and along the lines of qualifying better, that's how you lead laps.
"I think a lot of it stems from the qualifying and that's probably the biggest performance gain that we need to go out there and be one of the top contenders. I feel like our race performance has been on par with most of our competitors, it's just we're starting from a hole after Saturday."
What has caused the qualifying problems? Bell points to two culprits, one of which is himself. The other problem is the balance of the car. All of the Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas have speed, but the No. 20 team hasn't found the right balance for qualifying sessions.
Chase Briscoe, for comparison, has nine front row starts and an average starting position of 10.5. He has won the pole for six different races and qualified second for three.
Denny Hamlin has four front row starts, which includes three pole wins, and an average starting position of 13.2. Ty Gibbs doesn't have a pole win this season, but he has 13 top-10 starts and an average starting position of 14.1.
