From a NASCAR Fan’s View
The Cup teams take it to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway this afternoon and, as usual, this one could be one of the most interesting races of this 2025 season. There are a lot of reasons to start off with a statement like that and I’ll get to more on that but there are a lot of things going on to make this a memorable trip to Sin City for this NASCAR Cup race.
Okay, now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s start off with one of the things that many a talking and wondering about. No suspense here. Christopher Bell is going for his fourth win in a row today. It has been a while since that has happened and I don’t know about you but I’m kinda torn about it. On the one hand, he has driven like he is on a mission for the three wins before this race and I don’t expect that to change today. That being said, I kind of hope he does it but the reason I’m torn is that there are others I would like to see do well and possibly win today also.
Now don’t get me wrong. I have nothing against him and it is hard to argue with his success so far this season but, there does come a time of reckoning and this might be one of those times. I mean look at the person sitting on the pole. That would be Michael McDowell and he has a fast hot rod of a Chevy for starters. Joey Logano Starts outside pole and he is going for his possible fifth win if he can pull into Victory Lane when this one is over. Both of them are quite capable of doing just that and one of them just might.
Another thing that catches my eye about Christopher Bell is that he is starting from the thirteenth spot and has his work cut out for himself. A challenge like that hasn’t really slowed him down before so I don’t think that will make the difference today. What might make it difficult for him is the closeness of the qualifying times of much of the field. I don’t know if you noticed or not but it should reach out and grab your attention because it says something of how the race might go. The top twelve qualifiers for today’s race are separated by less than a tenth of a second. Add to that there are a bunch of drivers that qualified close to those drivers and less than a half second separates the thirty-third starter from the pole winner.
I don’t know what that says to you but what that says to this fan is it could be very hard to pass and that makes what happens in the pits and the strategy for this one becomes all the more important. I think it’s going to make for some very close racing and probably some high emotions when it comes down to passing and moving forward.
Add these things together and it could spell defeat for Christopher Bell taking his fourth win in a row even though I don’t think that will keep him from trying and possibly succeeding. But there are other things that need to be taken into account for which of the drivers might win this one.
I’ve already mentioned that Joey Logano is gunning for his fifth career victory at Vegas. Micheal McDowell wants to take his first win since moving to Spire Motorsports and since he delivered their first pole win at Vegas on Saturday. Kyle Bush starts from fourth position and would like nothing better than to break his losing streak in front of his home crowd. Erik Jones starting fifth wants to win for Legacy Motorsports in the lone Toyota starting in the top twelve. Alex Bowman leads the Hendrick camp starting from sixth, William Byron starts eighth and Kyle Larson starts tenth. You can bet all three of them want to keep Bell form taking his fourth in a row.
With the speeds as close as they are it is hard not to think that just about any of the starting lineup could win today at Vegas. In fact, its hard not to think that anyone but Bell could win. Bell has been very consistent so far this season and it is difficult to think he can’t win either. He has pulled more than one victory out of the jaws of defeat over his career.
All I’m saying as a race fan is that if he wins his fourth in row that’s great and he might be the strongest bet for possibly being the 2025 cup champ. Even without the win he is presently at the top of the list for making it to the Final Four and winning his first NASCAR Cup Championship.
If he loses this one, well… That’s racing!
Hey, this is Russ and that’s my view… See ya next time…
All views expressed are strictly the opinion of the writer
© March 16, 2025 – all rights reserved
Rusty Norman, Nascarfansview.com and Justafansview.com
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