Capture the Moment
Jul 07
by darren in The Feed 0 comments tags: Chicago, Nascar, van Gisbergen

Shane van Gisbergen completes perfect Chicago weekend

It was hot in Chicago this week, but Shane van Gisbergen was even hotter. The road course ace roared to the lead on Lake Shore Drive and ran away from the field in a nine-lap shootout, winning Sunday’s third annual Grant Park 165, the NASCAR Cup Series’ Chicago Street Race. The Trackhouse Racing driver, who won Saturday’s Xfinity Race and the Cup race’s pole, got his number 88 Chevrolet past leader Chase Briscoe with 16 laps left and had a 2.5 second lead over Ty Gibbs before a caution on the final lap gave him his second win of 2025. The victory was the Auckland, New Zealand native’s third in 33 career starts and helped Chevrolet to sweep three victories in the streets of Chicago. He started the weekend by winning the pole for the Sunday race. The 36-year-old Supercars champion then backed up his first career Cup victory in the Second City in 2023 by doing it again. “What an amazing weekend for me,” said van Gisbergen, who led 26 laps and dominated the series last month on Mexico City’s road layout. “We made no mistakes, and there were some really fast cars.” Van Gisbergen said the weather was […]
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Jul 06
by darren in The Feed 0 comments tags: Chicago, Nascar, SVG

Van Gisbergen storms to Xfinity win

Shane van Gisbergen capitalised on a late race restart to successfully defend his 2024 NASCAR Xfinity Series win in Chicago in stunning fashion. Having dominated the early stages, an unfortunate break threatened to derail van Gisbergen’s quest to go back-to-back, however it was a trademark charge through the field that saw him win his first Xfinity start of 2025. Van Gisbergen started second on the final restart with two laps to go, and muscled past JR Motorsports and Trackhouse stablemate Connor Zilisch at Turn 1, winning by 0.823s. It capped off a remarkable day for the Kiwi, who also claimed pole position for both the Xfinity race and tomorrow morning’s Cup Series race. “Yeah unreal, I thought it was going to be a lost cause when the strategy went wrong, but it worked out well,” said van Gisbergen in victory lane. “Thanks to JR Motorsports, the car was a rocket, WeatherTech, Red Bull, unreal day. Awesome day.” It was a much tougher day for Jack Perkins, who barely got into the race before it all unravelled for the 38-year-old. Having started a fine fifth in his first NASCAR start, Perkins dropped back two places in the opening laps before being […]
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Feb 06
by darren in The Feed 0 comments tags: Chicago, Nascar, SVG

SVG Wins Chicago

Three-time Supercars champion Shane van Gisbergen became the first driver in more than half a century to win a Cup race in their first start, taking the checkered flag in the inaugural Chicago Street Race on Sunday.
“This was so cool,” van Gisbergen told NBC Sports’ Marty Snider. “This is what you dream of. Hopefully I can come and do more.”
The 34-year-old van Gisbergen, who is from Auckland, New Zealand, becomes the first driver since Johnny Rutherford to win in his first Cup start. Rutherford won a Daytona qualifying race in 1963. Van Gisbergen is only the seventh driver in NASCAR’s 75 years to win in their first start.
“He was in a league of his own,” Chase Elliott said of van Gisbergen. “In my opinion, he put on a really big-time clinic. I don’t want to speak for everybody else, but he made me look bad. I kind of think the rest of us, too.”
Kyle Busch noted that van Gisbergen has driven cars similar for Cup cars for years.
“He’s probably four, five, eight years ahead of us in this sort of car,” Busch said.
Van Gisbergen gave Trackhouse Racing its second win in a row. He drove for Trackhouse Racing’s Project 91 effort, and his win comes a week after Ross Chastain won at Nashville.
He won a race shortened by darkness after being delayed by rain. The race was to have gone 100 laps but was shortened to 75 laps and then extended four laps by overtime.
Justin Haley finished second and was followed by Elliott, Kyle Larson and Kyle Busch, who overcame an early crash into the Turn 6 tire barrier to score a top five.
Sixth through 10th was Austin Cindric, Michael McDowell, Joey Logano, Ty Gibbs and Chris Buescher.
The race started on a wet course after rain much of the day, which delayed the beginning of the race by about 90 minutes. It was 20 laps in before teams started taking wet weather tires off and putting on slick tires as the racing line dried.
Only once was the track blocked in the event — something that many feared could happen multiple times in the race. The track was blocked in Turn 11 on Lap 50. William Byron missed the corner and then Corey LaJoie and Kevin Harvick made contact, Harvick hit the wall and came across the track and blocked half of it. Other cars ran into each other and the inside lane also was blocked.
Christopher Bell won both stages but saw his chances to win end quickly. When NASCAR announced on Lap 46 that the race would be shortened to 75 laps, he was leading, but some cars had already pitted and were in position to make it to the end. When Bell pitted, he restarted 12th behind those looking to make it to the end of the race.
On Lap 50, Bell was among those cars caught in the incident in Turn 11 that blocked the track. Five laps later, he spun in Turn 1, losing more positions. He finished 18th.
Tyler Reddick saw his hopes for a top-five finish end when he hit the Turn 6 tire barrier while running fourth. He finished 28th.
In the end, no one could catch van Gisbergen.
“The fans in Australia and New Zealand, the response this week and the coverage has been -- I can’t explain it,” he said. “Like the response and the support I’ve got from everyone and even over here how welcoming everyone is, I can’t believe it. Dream come true.”
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