Bubba Wallace has found himself embroiled in yet another NASCAR scandal after the controversial conclusion of Sunday’s race in Martinsville.
Wallace’s Latest NASCAR Controversy
Christopher Bell is not advancing to the championship stage of the NASCAR Cup Series after he was penalized for riding the wall during the final lap. After passing Wallace, a fellow Toyota driver, Bell had obtained enough points to beat out William Byron for the last championship spot.
So close, yet so far.
At the end of the race, however, it appeared that Wallace slowed down. This gave Bell the chance to pass him.
Afterwards, Wallace claimed that he was simply “nursing” his car, rather than trying to help out his teammate Bell.
“I went loose or something broke and he’s nursing it,” Wallace alleged. “And then he tried to slide me. I’m like ‘Brother.’ Just trying to bide our time and not crash and bring out out a caution. So that was it.”
Brother, that is one interesting explanation.
Wallace Accused Of ‘Race Manipulation’
Unfortunately for Wallace, many experts and fans alike weren’t having any of this. The Athletic insiders Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi fired back at Wallace on The Teardown podcast by accusing him of “race manipulation” with his “egregious” actions. Indeed, they firmly believe that he slowed down deliberately to help Bell.
“I mean, he can say, ‘Oh, my car was broken.’ He slowed down to give him a spot,” Gluck alleged. “His last lap there, I pulled it up somewhere. It was like, it was a 24-second-something lap, where everybody was running 21-second laps. So he considerably slowed down.”
Both Gluck and Bianchi believe that Bell didn’t need to resort to riding the wall in order to secure a playoff spot.
“If he just passes Bubba, he just gets by him because Bubba gives him the spot, what happens? What does NASCAR do?” Gluck asked. “Because, to me, clearly the Bubba thing was race manipulation.”
Of course, on the other hand, with Wallace out of the runnings, wouldn’t you want your teammate to do the same?
Related: Is Bubba Wallace About To Walk Away From NASCAR? ‘Racing Don’t Matter’
Bell Gets Disqualified
When the race concluded, NASCAR reviewed the footage and ultimately decided to disqualify Bell. Senior Vice President of competition Elton Sawyer claimed that Wallace’s role in this wasn’t considered before the disqualification was announced. Instead, he was penalized just for wall riding.
When asked if he believes Sawyer rode the wall on purpose, Sawyer replied, “Yeah, I’m not going to speculate on what Christopher did or said what he meant to do. That wouldn’t be fair to try to make that type of decision based off that.”
“We looked at the data. We looked at video,” he added. “We’ve been very clear, based off our conversations with our industry, based off that move two years ago, that that would not be tolerated.”
Bell Responds
The disqualification decision left Bell devastated.
“I don’t know what to say,” Bell said. “I understand that the rule was made to prevent people from riding the wall, but my move was completely different than what Ross [Chastain’s] was….I got loose getting into the corner and slid right into the fence…I don’t know what else to say.”
This isn’t the first time that Wallace has been involved in a NASCAR controversy, and it surely won’t be the last. No wonder that even after so many years, Wallace remains one of the most polarizing figures in all of NASCAR!