CHICAGO — Dashing through the downtown streets, Tyler Reddick and his crew chief Billy Scott made a heads-up call in the final nine laps to try and put themselves in position to win.
What changed the game for Reddick and Scott was a Lap 62 pit stop before the final two restarts. Though they’d lost track position and were forced to restart 13th the very next lap, the advantage on fresh tires allowed the No. 45 driver to navigate rush-hour traffic easily.
“When you have a tire advantage, you have a lot of options,” Reddick said after the race. “As long as you can get within one or two car lengths, you have many opportunities, many choices. I kind of experienced it with other cars coming through the field. If they choose to block, then they’re kind of opening the door for you to be aggressive and then use them up as well.”
Being a top-10 car for most of the 75-lapper, Reddick’s charge from the middle of the pack with fewer than 10 to go forced him to deal with a host of slower cars essentially for the first time of the afternoon. They were no match for the grip of the No. 45 machine, however.
“The second-to-last restart, that first restart there, we put those tires on. We got through Turn 1 OK, but the 2 [Austin Cindric] and 17 [Chris Buescher], some other cars had damage. Someone got spun around and on the driver’s left of Turn 2, and got some toe-link damage or something on the left rear. So lost some braking ability, and then that’s when we lost our track position, too, like the 19 [Chase Briscoe], the 42 [John Hunter Nemechek].
“Some of those other cars that were on the same tire strategy as us, we had to work our way back through them. There were other cars throughout the field on the way up that were difficult.”
Reddick could’ve had a shot to challenge eventual winner Shane van Gisbergen when Cody Ware went nose-first into the Turn 6 tire barrier on the second-to-last lap. However, the caution flew after SVG had taken the white flag, signaling an end to the event and leaving the No. 45 thinking: what if?
“I saw what Shane was willing to do to win at the race on Saturday. And, you know, for us needing a win to lock ourselves into the playoffs. You know, I would have raced really hard because I think he would have done the same, but it didn’t happen. But we can all dream and speculate what it could have been.
“(A caution) could (have) totally changed the outcome for the top 10, the top 20 in the race. … I think it definitely would have opened up Pandora’s box if you will, and, you know, drivers 10th on back would have been really aggressive for two laps, us on our fresher tires. We would have been able to be very aggressive as well in those two laps, so it’s just a tough deal. You know, it’s racing, sometimes that’s how it goes.”
The call for fresh tires was another master stroke for Scott atop the pit box, who stuck with a fuel-milage gamble to score back-to-back third-place finishes in the first two stages.
“The yellow came out at a fairly opportune time. We knew we were already pretty tight on fuel and having to work on saving toward the end, and we already had more laps than a lot of those guys we were racing.” Scott told NASCAR.com. “So you know, having already fallen back to third, we took the opportunity to get tires and make another shot at the win.
“I think we could have got second if it stayed green. Yes, we really knew we needed, from early on, the yellow to come out to have another shot at another restart, to really contend for the win.”
Reddick remains 13th on the playoff bubble after a third-place finish in Chicago, sitting 143 points to the good and keeping his $1 million hopes alive in the In-Season Challenge. But with another road course on deck next week at Sonoma Raceway, it presents a shot for the No. 45 not to have to worry about stacking more points and just winning his way into the playoffs.
No. 32 seed Ty Dillon’s Cinderella run in the In-Season Challenge continued in the Chicago Street Race as his competitor, No. 17 seed Brad Keselowski, bowed out early in the Lap 3 wreck that mangled multiple cars. That was good enough for Dillon, who finished 20th at Chicago and upset Denny Hamlin last week, to advance to the third round at Sonoma. How far Dillon can take it is anyone’s guess at this point (he’ll face Alex Bowman next week), but his story added some flair to what was another dramatic weekend in NASCAR’s inaugural tournament on TNT Sports.
Here’s where we stand after Chicago and before next Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway:
Chicago Street Race winner:Shane van Gisbergen made it two wins in three races at Chicago as the driver of the No. 88 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet continued to exert his dominance at the road courses. However, his victory had no bearing on the In-Season Challenge because SVG wasn’t among the top 32 drivers in points after Nashville who qualified for the tournament.
Who advances to Round 3: (6) Ty Gibbs, (8) Alex Bowman, (12) John Hunter Nemechek, (14) Zane Smith, (15) Ryan Preece, (20) Erik Jones, (23) Tyler Reddick and (32) Ty Dillon.
Bowman pushed Bubba Wallace out of the way with six laps to go at Chicago and went on to win their matchup in what was one of the most dramatic moments of Sunday’s race. It was the second straight season where Bowman and Wallace had a dust-up at Chicago with Bowman benefitting both times (including last year’s win). The drivers gave each other a good-natured ribbing in the lead-up to Sunday’s race, but the tone post-race didn’t sound as chummy. There could be plenty of chances for Wallace to spoil Bowman’s fun next week on the winding road course at Sonoma.
For the second straight year at Chicago, Ty Gibbs ran up front and had one of his better races of the season, finishing second to SVG and beating out noted road-course ace AJ Allmendinger (who finished sixth). Gibbs, who was second on the final restart, held off Allmendinger, in third, and pulled away from him to win their matchup comfortably. Up next is No. 14 seed Zane Smith, a California native. Gibbs will be the favorite, but only slightly if you consider his previous finishes at Sonoma of 18th and 37th.
Most interesting matchup in Round 3 of the challenge: No. 12 seed John Hunter Nemechek vs. No. 20 seed Erik Jones. Legacy Motor Club teammates will battle it out in Wine Country with a trip to the final four on the line. Nemechek finished 15th and just ahead of Chase Elliott in 16th to advance, while Jones’ 25th-place result was good enough to beat Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who spun in the final stage and finished 31st. Jones has an average finish of 17.7 in 10 races at Sonoma. Nemechek has just one start at Sonoma in the Cup Series, but in the Xfinity Series, he had a best finish of eighth place in two races. In head-to-head matchups against each other, Jones has prevailed 30 times to Nemechek’s 25 times, according to Racing Insights.
Who’s up
Tyler Reddick, No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota. Reddick finished third at Chicago to easily take down Carson Hocevar, who ignited the Lap 3 multicar wreck that ended the No. 77’s day. It was the continuation of a hot start to the In-Season Challenge for Reddick, who finished fourth last week at EchoPark Speedway (formerly Atlanta Motor Speedway). Reddick appears to have recovered from his lull at Mexico City and Pocono that led to him getting the No. 23 seed. Reddick will face No. 15 seed Ryan Preece at Sonoma, a driver he holds a 58-35 advantage over head-to-head.
Who’s down
Chris Buescher, No. 17 RFK Racing Ford. With several top seeds knocked out at EchoPark, the In-Season Challenge seemed to be there for the taking for the No. 3 seed Buescher, especially with two road courses on tap. However, Buescher found himself on pit road with the hood up in Stage 1 at Chicago thanks to a problem with the electronic control unit, and although his team worked hard to get him back in the race, he couldn’t recover enough to get past No. 14 seed Zane Smith, who finished 14th to Buescher’s 18th. In addition, Buescher remains winless this season and in a dogfight just to make the playoffs.
CHICAGO – A key In-Season Challenge matchup between old rivals ended in contact Sunday in the Chicago Street Race, with Bubba Wallace getting the short end of a tightly fought contest with Alex Bowman inside the top 10.
The two drivers sorted it out with a post-race chat on the passageway to the NASCAR Cup Series garage area, stopping in front of a boisterous group of fans, who had a front-row seat for the talk as they left the Grant Park grounds. That brief conversation, though, left Bowman with a different impression than his first hunch, that their rivalry had been stoked anew.
The duo collided multiple times in a fierce fight for seventh place late in the Grant Park 165. Bowman, the No. 8 seed in the bracket-style tournament, was charging forward with a bit of an advantage, riding on fresher tires than the No. 9-seeded Wallace had.
Bowman made contact with Wallace from behind exiting Turn 2 at Lap 70 in the 75-lap affair, spinning Wallace down DuSable Lake Shore Drive. Bowman – the 2024 Chicago race winner – continued to an eighth-place finish, but Wallace’s No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota suffered a broken toe link in the incident and was saddled with a 28th-place result, five laps down. Both appeared in a pre-race interview Sunday with TNT Sports to joke about their past incidents together ahead of their In-Season Challenge head-to-head matchup. Bowman moved on to the Round of 8, while Wallace was eliminated.
After exiting his No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, Bowman initially said he thought the rivalry pendulum had swung back to the antagonistic side.
“I thought we had squashed our beef, but clearly we’ve not,” Bowman initially told reporters post-race. “I don’t know. I followed the 45 (Tyler Reddick) past him. He ran me into the inside wall in (Turn) 8. Still felt like I passed him clean, then he absolutely just demolished me into (Turn) 12. I gave it back a little bit into 1, and then he demolished me again into 2, ran me into the outside wall and then I’m just a pinball between him and the outside wall at that point.
“So certainly not trying to crash anybody. I mean, I’d have to watch it back to be certain, but I felt like he did it to himself because I kept pinballing between him and the outside wall. So yeah, wasn’t the intention.”
That tune changed after his conversation with Wallace, who had just left the track’s care center for an evaluation.
“I wish I would have talked to him before all my interviews, because I did all the interviews under the context that he thought I right-reared him and just crashed him,” Bowman told NASCAR.com outside the No. 48 hauler. “And then I talked to him, and he thought I was crossing him over and he was clear outside. Spotters can’t see over there, and I was just outside of him, and he moved up. And I hate to say he did it to himself, but he did it to himself, and that’s what he was saying, like he thought I was crossing over.
“So yeah, I hate that I did a bunch of interviews like, ‘what the hell, man?’ But yeah, I’m sure he’s not happy that he got crashed, but at the same time, like I’m between him and the fence. There’s not so much you can do.”
The two drivers had a run-in during last year’s street race as well, with Wallace turned sideways off the nose of Bowman’s No. 48 Chevrolet early in the 2024 contest. Wallace recovered to finish 13th while Bowman surged to the victory, and Wallace initiated contact with Bowman’s door on the cooldown lap, drawing a $50,000 fine from NASCAR days later.
It was an adventure-filled day for Wallace, who dropped to the rear of the field for the start of Sunday’s race after incidents in Saturday’s qualifying session. He made it up to 18th at the end of Stage 1, but his No. 23 entry was sent spinning after contact with the No. 5 Chevy of Kyle Larson on Lap 25, knocking him back to 32nd in the running order.
Wallace rallied and netted fifth place at the end of Stage 2, residing in the top 10 when his contest with Bowman came to a head on Chicago’s cozy street layout.
“I’m just proud of the effort,” Wallace told NASCAR.com outside the care center. “You know, late call on the 5 that got us spun. Hated that. Just when you think everything’s going OK, but we were able to jump ship and switch up plans, put us right back in the race. So man, I was passing cars, having fun, showing that we keep improving and keep building confidence. We’ll be fine. So hate to see it end that way. It was fun. Fun with the 48. No love lost, all good.”
Bowman had also fought his way back up through the field in his defense of last year’s Chicago Street Race victory and in his quest for a win that would solidify his Cup Series Playoffs footing. The No. 48 also dropped to the rear after issues in Saturday’s preliminaries, and he was one spot in front of Wallace in fourth at the Stage 2 break.
Bowman emerged with a measure of continued momentum, posting his fourth consecutive finish of 11th or better. He also left Chicago with a better grasp of how the decisive late-race clash played out.
“Yeah, I feel better now understanding what happened there,” Bowman told NASCAR.com. “Yeah, lots of ups and downs, and it was a fight. It’s a standard 48 day. We fought hard and glad it worked out there in the end.”
CHICAGO — Once again, Shane van Gisbergen asserted his superiority on the streets of Chicago, and in doing so, he matched a major NASCAR milestone.
In winning the Grant Park 165 on the Chicago Street Course, the New Zealander completed a weekend sweep of the NASCAR Cup Series and Xfinity Series races, both from the pole position.
Taking the checkered flag under caution, after Cody Ware plowed into the Turn 6 tire barrier as van Gisbergen charged through Turn 12 on the next-to-last lap, SVG matched Kyle Busch’s sweep of both races from the pole at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in July of 2016. No other driver has won races in NASCAR’s top two divisions from the pole on the same weekend.
The three-time Australian Supercars champion said he was panicked at the possibility of a caution and potential overtime after Ware’s wreck, but he reached the start/finish to start the final lap before NASCAR called the caution.
“What an amazing weekend for me,” said van Gisbergen, who drove the No. 88 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet to his second Cup victory on the 2.2-mile, 12-turn circuit, his second win this season and the third of his career.
“Lucky guy to drive some great cars. I thank Trackhouse, WeatherTech Chevy and all these guys and girls here — what an amazing weekend. Thanks everyone for coming out, and hope we put on a good show.”
Ty Gibbs ran second, equaling his career-best finish last year at Darlington. Tyler Reddick restarted 15th on fresh tires with nine laps left and climbed to third before he ran out of time.
Van Gisbergen took the lead for the final time on Lap 60, moving to the inside of front-running Chase Briscoe in Turn 2, racing side-by-side with the recent Pocono winner through Turn 3 and out-braking him into Turn 4 to gain the top spot.
From that point, SVG had to survive two cautions and restarts, the latter for Austin Cindric’s stalled car.
After that sixth yellow, Gibbs, running second, didn’t get a strong launch on the final restart and fell a car-length behind before reaching Turn 1. SVG pulled away from the No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota from that point on.
“Well, it really depends on the restart zone, because it’s right in that last corner, and the dude on the outside gets shafted every single time,” said Gibbs, who restarted on the outside approaching Turn 12.
“If you watch every one of them, the inside guy wins almost every time. He just got a good enough gap, had a good restart. I had a little bit of rear tire degradation that didn’t really help me on my launch off the corner. (He) just got a good gap and got away from me.”
For Reddick, the race was a case of déjà vu. Last year, he chased race winner Alex Bowman with a faster car over the closing laps and finished second.
“We kind of ended up in a tough spot there on the penultimate restart, I guess,” Reddick said. “Some of the cars were spinning — I can’t name them all, but unfortunately we kind of just got stuck in the wrong lane where I had to check up. I got behind those cars that we were on the same tire strategy as us, so we just lost a bit of time there passing those cars back.
“It’s great to finish third, but it’s for sure a bummer when you look at how much ground you made up.”
For the first time in the three years of the Chicago Street Race, rain didn’t play a role — but anticipation of possible thunderstorms did.
As the race neared conclusion, fog and storm clouds began to roll in from the north, but rain didn’t reach the track until after the checkered flag.
“The strategy was a bit all over the place, as we knew it would be today, racing the weather, racing cars and different (pit) stops,” Van Gisbergen said. “Stephen (Doran, crew chief) did a really good job on the box all day of just painting the picture in my head of who I was up against.
“We had two great pit stops. Just so stoked to get (sponsor) WeatherTech in Victory Lane for their home race.”
Michael McDowell got past SVG at the start of the race and led the first 31 laps and won Stage 1, but he had to take his car to the DVP (damaged vehicle policy) area to repair a stuck throttle and lost 22 laps in the garage.
A massive eight-car crash on Lap 3 blocked the track between Turns 10 and 11 and forced a stoppage of 14 minutes, 42 seconds. Carson Hocevar started the melee when he clipped the inside wall in Turn 10 and crashed into the opposite wall with enough force to move the Jersey barrier.
Hocevar’s No. 77 Chevrolet turned sideways, and the cars of Brad Keselowski, Daniel Suárez, Todd Gilliland, Will Brown and Riley Herbst piled into the wreck. Only Herbst and Suárez were able to continue.
“I didn’t see it until the last second,” Keselowski said. “I slowed down, and I actually felt I was going to get stopped, and then I just kind of got ran over from behind. It’s just a narrow street course, and sometimes there’s nowhere to go.”
Keselowski’s early exit made a winner of No. 32 seed Ty Dillon in the In-Season Challenge. Dillon will face Bowman in next Sunday third-round event at Sonoma Raceway, after Bowman traded shot after shot with his Chicago opponent, Bubba Wallace, until Wallace spun in the closing laps to lose the head-to-head battle.
Ryan Preece ran seventh and eliminated 30th-place finisher Noah Gragson. He’ll face Reddick, who ousted Hocevar. Gibbs prevailed over sixth-place finisher AJ Allmendinger and will race against Zane Smith at Sonoma.
Smith came home 14th and knocked out 18th-place Chris Buescher, who ran most of the race with an engine down on power.
Series leader William Byron was out of the race with a broken clutch after one lap and finished 40th. His lead in the Cup Series points standings over second-place Elliott shrank to 13 points.
The Cup Series continues its road-course stretch with a westward trip to Sonoma Raceway next Sunday (3:30 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
NOTE: Post-race technical inspection concluded without issue, confirming van Gisbergen as Sunday’s winner.
Mechanical issues thwarted a promising effort for Michael McDowell and the No. 71 Spire Motorsports team in Sunday’s Chicago Street Race.
McDowell started second and led each of the opening 31 laps of the Grant Park 165 after passing polesitter Shane van Gisbergen in the opening corner. But an issue with his throttle cable sent him to pit road under the third caution period of the 75-lapper, dropping the 2021 Daytona 500 champion from race-winning contention.
The team was forced to go behind the wall to a designated area to work on the car under NASCAR’s Damaged Vehicle Policy.
“We’re gonna have to drive to DVP here to go work on our throttle pedal cable,” crew chief Travis Peterson radioed to McDowell. “We’re gonna have to do it over there. That’s where the part is, and it’s gonna take forever to get this fixed for the car.”
McDowell is a two-time winner in the NASCAR Cup Series, most recently earning a victory in August 2023 on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course. He drove the No. 71 Chevrolet to the Stage 1 victory in Sunday’s race in Chicago to score Spire Motorsports its first stage win.
The No. 71 car returned to the race at Lap 57 and finished 32nd, 22 laps behind race-winner van Gisbergen.
“The throttle cable just broke,” a dejected McDowell said post-race. “I don’t know what caused it or how it got to that spot, but that’s what happened. I feel like we had control of the race the whole race. I think it would have been a battle, no doubt. I felt like any time I needed to open a gap on SVG, I could. We were just working on our strategy. We knew we were going to one-stop it, so I was taking care of the tires and doing all the things I could.
“I was behind the pace car, and the throttle stuck wide-open. Luckily, I got to the switches fast enough before I ran into something, and then a cable broke after that. It’s just a shame. We had a great car. We’ve got some good momentum heading into Sonoma, and we know what we’ve got to do.”
McDowell exits Chicago 24th in the provisional playoff standings, 77 points out of the 16-driver postseason grid with seven races remaining in the regular season. A victory would propel McDowell into the playoffs. His next opportunity comes Sunday at Sonoma Raceway (3:30 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). But he believes his best chance yet was this weekend in Chicago.
“I know what would have happened. We would have won the race,” McDowell said.
Multiple cars were involved in a Lap 3 crash during Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race on the Chicago Street Course.
Carson Hocevar contacted both the right- and left-side walls exiting Turn 10 while running seventh. With damaged suspension, the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet then spun back across the track and created a block ahead of the majority of the field.
Austin Dillon was the first bystander to be collected before others like Brad Keselowski, Todd Gilliland, Daniel Suárez, Riley Herbst and reigning Supercars champion Will Brown piled in with nowhere to go on Michigan Avenue.
AJ Allmendinger, Josh Berry, Austin Cindric and Cole Custer also sustained damage in the incident. The race was red-flagged and brought to a halt to allow crews to clear the wrecks.
Hocevar, Dillon, Keselowski, Gilliland and Brown were unable to continue and were ruled out of the race. Finishing 35th, Hocevar was the No. 26 seed in the second round of the In-Season Challenge and did not advance over No. 23 Tyler Reddick, who finished third. Keselowski entered Sunday as the No. 17 seed but finished 37th and will not advance over 20th-place finisher and No. 32 seed Ty Dillon, who along with Reddick advances to the third round Sunday, July 13 at Sonoma Raceway (3:30 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Keselowski, Brown, Dillon and Gilliland were all evaluated and released from the infield care center after mandatory trips. The early exit ended a two-race stretch of top-10 finishes for Keselowski, the 2012 Cup champion.
“I didn’t see it until the last second,” Keselowski said. “I slowed down and I actually felt I was gonna get stopped and then I just kind of got ran over from behind. It’s just a narrow street course and sometimes there’s nowhere to go.”
Dillon qualified 10th in the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet for Sunday’s race but quickly became a victim of circumstances ahead of him as he directly trailed Hocevar when the No. 77 Chevrolet impacted the walls and spun.
“Disappointing day in the No. 3 Breztri Chevrolet at the Chicago Street Race,” said Dillon, whose only other DNF this year came at Circuit of The Americas in March. “Crew chief Richard Boswell and everyone on the RCR team brought a really fast Chevrolet to the streets of Chicago. We qualified 10th and thought we would be a contender today in the race. A car spun in front of us on the first lap and it ended our day before we could even get it started. It’s a shame and I’m just at a loss for words at this point. We’ll just keep bringing cars like this and hope our luck turns around for us at some point.”
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Visit our NASCAR YouTube page Sunday evening following the Chicago Street Race to get a breakdown and analysis from veteran crew chief and broadcaster Steve Letarte, alongside additional co-hosts and reporters from the track.
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CHICAGO — The fans got their money’s worth with two world-class road racers and teammates in Connor Zilisch and Shane van Gisbergen on the front row with a two-lap shootout to decide the winner.
The No. 9 of van Gisbergen didn’t hesitate to move the No. 88 Chevrolet in Turn 1 on the final restart, which bounced Zilisch off the wall. Fortunately, Zilisch was able to recover to finish second, but after an adversity-filled day, the JR Motorsports driver was left to watch van Gisbergen’s burnout from pit road, wishing he had one more lap to get SVG back.
“By no means does he have to leave the room. I expected it, but I won’t expect it next time,” Zilisch said. “I’m not mad about it, but like I said, I just wish I could have him back. I would have done it differently.”
And what exactly was his plan if he could go back in time and relive the final start?
“I was clear by a foot just before the breaking zone. I would have taken it and not let him get to my left side. I wanted to be on the right side, though, exiting [Turn] 1 to be on the inside for [Turn] 2,” Zilisch added. “So that’s kind of my plan, and why I let him get to my left side. But had I known he was just going to not let me stay outside of him out of one, I would have blocked and not let him get to my inside. So, yeah, live and learn. But I mean, it’s just part of it. He’s got a lot more experience than me. These are the moments I can learn from him and make myself better.”
Though Zilisch has continuously turned heads since his national series debut, the 18-year-old phenom — who’s just weeks away from turning 19 — lamented his battle with van Gisbergen only sharpens him to have elbows out in late-race situations.
“That’s racing, and you know, it wasn’t dirty. It was just aggressive and something I’ll take note of,” Zilisch said. “I was trying to race him as respectful as possible. But when it comes to racing for the win, you know, all of us are going to do whatever we can to win, and I should have done more.”
Both Zilisch and van Gisbergen had to make their way from deep in the field to get back up front. For Zilisch he started 35th after crashing in practice and not setting a time in qualifying earlier in the day. While van Gisbergen had to restart 19th after a strategy call to stay out late and pit halfway through the race, he also had to battle a cool shirt malfunction around the same time.
Zilisch’s march from worst to first was complete by Lap 38 once he passed Sheldon Creed in Turn 5, and just four laps later, SVG was second 3.7 seconds behind, starting his hunt on the rookie. However, once the caution came out with five to go, the final restart was set to determine whether Zilisch would earn his third win of the season or if SVG would remain supreme on the streets of Chicago.
“I thought our teammate ran him pretty wide off the corner right there. I thought that was a difference in a race,” Mardy Lindley, Zilisch’s crew chief told NASCAR.com. “Me, personally, should have left him [Zilisch] a lane, because we were clear here, and we just didn’t want to chop him and get in front of him, we chose not to do that. Then he used us up down there. So whoever got the lead on the restart was going to win the race.”
Zilisch won’t have to wait long for a shot at redemption, as next week the Xfinity Series heads west to Sonoma Raceway, where he will no doubt be a favorite and aim to collect his third checkered flag of 2025.
Track: Chicago Street Course Location: Chicago Track length: 2.2 miles When: Sunday, 2 p.m. ET Where to tune in: TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Race purse: $11,704,450 Race distance: 75 laps | 165 miles Stages: 20 | 45 | 75 Defending winner: Alex Bowman, July 2024 Starting lineup: Shane van Gisbergen seals Busch Light Pole
Street-savvy Shane van Gisbergen still the Chicago benchmark
“I’m a lucky boy,” Shane van Gisbergen beamed Saturday afternoon after claiming two NASCAR national-series pole positions in the span of about three hours on the Chicago Street Course. The darling of the Windy City was referencing his good fortune at having top-notch equipment for the weekend doubleheader, but luck may have very little to do with his show of speed.
Plenty of headlines have been scratched out in the days leading up to Sunday’s Grant Park 165, touting, “Can anyone beat SVG?” Trackhouse Racing teammate Ross Chastain says it’s a fair question.
“Very fair. Good luck,” Chastain said with a laugh, this after qualifying 22nd — 1.549 seconds off van Gisbergen’s fast time. “I mean, I just want to be second. Yeah, I just wanted to be within, like, my goal today was … try to go as fast as him, but realistically, I wanted to be within like a second, and I wasn’t. I thought once I got here, I thought I could get it to like half a second after all of our prep, and just not the case. So yeah, it’s just incredible. We have identical cars. He’s that good.”
Recent results and another powerful qualifying effort suggest that SVG could be celebrating with another rugby-ball kick into the Chicago bleachers come Sunday afternoon. The inaugural Chicago Street winner has momentum after prevailing three weeks ago in Mexico City, where he dusted the field by a whopping 16½ seconds to lock up his first-ever berth in the Cup Series Playoffs. He tacked on a triumph from the pole in Saturday’s Xfinity Series matinee.
Chase Briscoe could only shake his head after briefly snaring the provisional pole, only to have van Gisbergen knock him off by 0.617 seconds. Briscoe has more poles (four) than any Cup Series driver this season but was fifth-fastest in Saturday’s session.
Despite all the recent headway, SVG hasn’t been infallible when NASCAR goes to road-racing circuits. Van Gisbergen started and finished sixth at Circuit of The Americas in March when a two-horse race went to Christopher Bell over a fading Kyle Busch. Just last September, Chris Buescher pounced on a final-lap mistake to top SVG head-to-head at Watkins Glen, and the RFK Racing veteran holds a Next Gen-best average finish of 8.79 on road courses.
Even still, van Gisbergen remains the standard that the field is aiming to reach.
“I’ve been able to hang around with him at the Legends Car track, right, and it’s been fun to see just how his brain operates and what he looks forward to on ovals versus road courses,” said Bubba Wallace, referencing Charlotte Motor Speedway’s Summer Shootout Series. “But yeah, I mean, he’s the benchmark. He’s on top of the Xfinity board right now for a reason, because he’s pretty damn good. Yeah, he gets humbled when we go back to ovals, though.”
Several drivers were humbled by Chicago’s tight confines during Saturday’s practice and qualifying, putting a fair share of big names deep in the 40-car field for Sunday’s green flag. Wallace was among those after an adventure-filled session that left his No. 23 Toyota 37th on the grid. Behind him are Hendrick Motorsports teammates William Byron (38th) and Chase Elliott (39th) — ranked first and second respectively in Cup Series points — after separate contact in practice kept them from making qualifying attempts. Denny Hamlin is set to start last after the engine on his No. 11 Toyota expired just minutes after practice began. Hendrick will make a clean sweep of cars at the back of the pack after the No. 48 team of Alex Bowman and the No. 5 team of Kyle Larson opted to make repairs — both unapproved adjustments that will force them to the rear during pace laps.
A scarcity of extensive runoff area on the temporary course took its toll in Saturday’s preliminaries. A lack of grip didn’t help.
“The track’s very treacherous. It’s slick,” said Brad Keselowski, who starts 15th Sunday. “There were a lot of areas that had new pavement last year that have had a summer and a winter, and that had an effect. For whatever reason, the tires didn’t take to the track like I felt it would. It’s supposed to be a softer tire and it’s been very, very slick.”
What do crew chiefs have in focus to win Sunday’s race?
Race tracks age. The complexion of each racing surface on the circuit changes year over year, with climate and use altering its character. Both of those factors reach extremes with the Chicago Street Course.
The wear and tear of traffic coursing through the third-largest city in the country has accelerated the rough nature of the 2.2-mile layout, where Cup Series teams will compete in Sunday’s Grant Park 165. Combine that with the harsh Midwest winters commonplace here, and it’s another wrinkle to conquer on the already snug circuit.
“I think the biggest thing from a setup standpoint is just the content of the track, right?” said Richard Boswell, crew chief for Austin Dillon’s No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet. “The track surface itself is roads that big dump trucks are driving on every day, and from a content standpoint, there’s just so much more, so it requires you to set your car up a little more compliant so that the driver is not all over the limiters and rub blocks. So from that standpoint, I would say that’s the biggest difference. These are just everyday roads that are not in the greatest of shape, not in the same shape that the tracks we typically race on are, for sure, and then on the other side of that, there’s zero forgiveness on track. Like there’s barriers around you on both sides, there’s very few runoffs, so just everything has to be a bit more precise.”
NASCAR competition officials have tried to mitigate the rough nature of the circuit with patches where the streets are at their bumpiest, repairing the concrete in an area between Turns 5 and 6. Teams have also found new pavement in Turn 11, the result of city maintenance between last year and now.
The changes made Friday’s pre-race track walk a well-attended affair, with drivers and crews being extra observant.
“Most of that just comes with the street config, and what’s happened to the pavement over the year,” said Blake Harris, crew chief for the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevy and defending race winner Alex Bowman. “Like, this is where 18-wheelers run up and down the road every day. … So I think they’ve done a little bit of repaving in some sections, so how will that affect the handling of car? I think from the car perspective, that’s the biggest thing.”
The other major factor has been a variable weather forecast, which has wavered with the area’s precipitation chances each day leading up to Sunday. Teams have had to bolt on wet-weather Goodyear tires in each of the previous two runnings of the Chicago Street Race, and both editions have been shortened by rain delays and darkness.
Trying to game-plan around those uncertainties has made calling an effective race strategy more complex.
“We haven’t had a race go the distance yet, right? So it’s definitely been unique the first two years, and I think that uniqueness has come from being rain-shortened or time-shortened,” Boswell said. “So I think it’s hard to sit there and look at any certain strategy and say, ‘hey, that’s the one,’ simply because we haven’t run a full event yet. And quite frankly, it looks like on Sunday, we could have another similar situation. So from that standpoint, I think it is very similar to any other road course. Track position is going to be king. Anything you can do to get the track position, even if you don’t have a P1 car, just having P1 position is probably worth 15 spots. So trying to get track position and keep it is the No. 1 priority, and then I think you just kind of have to be fluid.”
Harris echoed that sentiment, noting how wildly the forecast has fluctuated this week.
“I’m banking on right now the set of decisions that come along with that,” Harris said. “You look back on the stuff that you think made your car good in the wet. OK, how much do you keep it like that versus a complete dry race? But I believe we went into last year Sunday, the day before, not thinking it was going to rain, and it rained. So I just assume every time we come here, it’s going to rain at some point. So we’ll be looking at those rain tires and the rain setups and all those strategies. I think right now, we’ve probably got seven different strategies in play for Sunday right now, and it just kind of depends on what Mother Nature does to us.”
If he’s not first, he’s last. The Windy City streets are the site of Shane van Gisbergen’s tied-for-best finish in the Cup Series and his worst. SVG burst onto the stock-car scene with a career-altering victory in his Cup debut in 2023 in the inaugural Chicago Street Race. He returned the next year as a heavy favorite but ended up as the event’s first retiree in 40th place after jolting a barrier in a ricochet wreck with Chase Briscoe in wet-weather conditions.
He may not be the favorite to win, but watch out for …
MICHAEL McDOWELL. The stature of SVG heading into Sunday’s event has dwarfed the odds of several strong road-course racers, and McDowell is among the best of that bunch. The Spire Motorsports driver has placed seventh and fifth in his two previous Chicago Street efforts, starting from the first three rows in both of those instances. He was also fifth in the Cup Series’ most recent road-course go, the inaugural visit to Mexico City, and he will start second Sunday.
James Gilbert | Getty Images
Fantasy update
NASCAR Fantasy Live expert Dustin Albino provides insight for your Sunday lineup.
Treacherous is the word of the weekend on the streets of Chicago, with the margin of error being slim due to a lack of grip. The quartet of Hendrick Motorsports teammates, including two who were in my original lineup, found out the hard way during practice and qualifying and will have to start at the rear of the field. A lot can happen over 165 miles, but track position is crucial. I’ve dropped both Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman in favor of Tyler Reddick and road-course menace Chris Buescher. Kyle Busch is another driver worth considering for your lineup, as the No. 8 Chevrolet qualified a season-best sixth at a road course.
Lineup: Shane van Gisbergen, Michael McDowell, Ty Gibbs, Tyler Reddick, Chris Buescher. Garage: Christopher Bell.
Our biggest pieces of the week — get covered for race day from all angles.
• NASCAR at Chicago: Key info, practice reports and more from doubleheader weekend | Read more
• In-Season Challenge: Your hub for everything related to the 32-driver showdown | Read more • Racing Insights: Where your favorite driver is projected to finish Sunday | Read more
• Field of 16: Bowman, Gibbs aiming for a postseason plus in Chicago | Read more • Turning Point to Chicago: Picking up bracket pieces post-Atlanta | Read more
• At-track photos: Scenes, sights from the Chicago streets | View gallery
• NASCAR Classics: Rewind with full race replays from Chicago Street, Chicagoland Speedway
• Paint Scheme Preview: Windy City designs ready to rip through Chicago | View gallery
• Power Rankings: Post-Atlanta pecking order, including a new No. 1 | This week’s Top 20
CHICAGO — In a dream matchup between the veteran road-course king and the 18-year-old pretender to the throne on the streets of the “Windy City,” Shane van Gisbergen schooled his young JR Motorsports teammate in winning Saturday’s The Loop 110.
With his cool suit malfunctioning on a hot day on the 2.2-mile, 12-turn Chicago Street Course, van Gisbergen out-braked runner-up Connor Zilisch and ran him wide into Turn 1 with two laps left in the marquee event.
With Zilisch in determined but futile pursuit, van Gisbergen crossed the finish line 0.823 seconds ahead of his fellow Red Bull athlete to post his first NASCAR Xfinity Series victory in his only start this season, his second straight win in Chicago and the fourth of his career.
Van Gisbergen, the pole winner, had to overcome not only the heat but also a balky carburetor and questionable strategy that kept him on the track before the end of Stage 1, while the vast majority of cars behind him came to pit road for tires and fuel.
“The strategy went wrong, but it worked out well,” said van Gisbergen, who also will start on the pole in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race. “The car was a rocket. (Zilisch) is a great young driver, and that was the first time I’ve really raced him. I knew that was my opportunity, and I took it. Awesome 1-2 for the team.”
The 36-year-old New Zealander, a three-time Australian Supercars champion, is the sixth different driver to win for JR Motorsports this year, the most in series history for an organization in a single season. Due to the heat and malfunctioned cool suit, SVG visited the infield care center and was later treated and released.
Zilisch acknowledged he was surprised at the aggressiveness of van Gisbergen’s attack in Turn 1, though he insisted it wasn’t a dirty move.
“I was clear there, just barely, on the front straight, and I just let him get to my inside, and he took advantage of it,” said Zilisch, who started 35th after hitting a tire barrier during practice earlier in the day. “I should have been a little more aggressive there. I just thought he was going to race me a little cleaner.
“I’ve just got to be better and not let that stuff happen. I’ll learn from it and move on.”
Third-place Sheldon Creed was the best of the rest, finishing 3.141 seconds behind the race winner. Creed led the field to green for a restart with 13 laps left but lost the top spot to Zilisch before he got back to the start/finish line.
“I’ve got to get better at road-course racing,” Creed said. “Those guys are really good, and when SVG got to me, I just let him go because he had way more pace. Maybe I could get them racing and give me a shot.”
Clearly, that didn’t happen.
By staying on the track late in the 15-lap first stage, van Gisbergen was mired mid-pack when he eventually pitted on Lap 26. He restarted 19th on Lap 29 after an inopportune debris caution and quickly worked his way forward.
By Lap 36, he was seventh and began a determined pursuit of Zilisch, who led Laps 38 to 48. On Lap 44, with Zilisch saving fuel, van Gisbergen ran the fastest lap of the race (90.947 seconds) and cut Zilisch’s lead from 3.5 seconds to 2.3 seconds before Andre Castro planted his car in the Turn 6 tire barrier to cause the sixth and final caution and set up the two-lap shootout.
On fresher tires, the one benefit of the later pit stop, van Gisbergen prevailed. Van Gisbergen led 27 laps to Zilisch’s 11 and Creed’s nine.
Austin Hill ran fourth and Atlanta winner Nick Sanchez finished fifth. Jesse Love, Sammy Smith, Sam Mayer, Austin Green and Brennan Poole completed the top 10.
Justin Allgaier, who finished 23rd after suffering brake issues late in the race, leads second-place Hill by 49 points in the series standings.
The Xfinity Series heads west for its annual trip to Sonoma Raceway next Saturday (4:30 p.m. ET, The CW, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
NOTE: Post-race technical inspection concluded without issue, confirming SVG as the race winner.
