Posted on by Reid Spencer

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.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

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.”

SHOP: Winner gear

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.

WATCH: Hocevar slams wall, cars collide

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.

John Hunter Nemechek finished 15th, one spot ahead of Chase Elliott, to eliminate the driver of the No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet from the In-Season Challenge. Nemechek will face his Legacy Motor Club teammate Erik Jones, who advanced when Ricky Stenhouse Jr. retired after colliding with a barrier.

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.

Posted on by Staff Report

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.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

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.”

MORE: Cup Series standings | Cup Series schedule

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.

Posted on by Staff Report

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.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

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.”

Posted on by Staff Report

Can’t wait any longer to go Inside the Race following each NASCAR Cup Series event?

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.

Sunday’s post-race show will analyze all the twists and turns of the Grant Park 165, with Letarte and host Alex Weaver dissecting the winning and losing moves, plus other top story lines, all from the Sunoco Content Station.

Posted on by Alex Cadavid

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.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos 

“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.

Posted on by Zack Albert

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

RELATED: How to watch on TNT Sports, truTV

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.

RELATED: Cup standings | Full 2025 schedule

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.

MORE: 2025 NASCAR In-Season Challenge hub | Inside the tracks of In-Season Challenge

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.”

MORE: Full Saturday recap

Chris Buescher's No. 17 Ford rips through the turns at the Chicago Street Course
Chris Graythen | Getty Images

From atop the pit box …

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.”

RELATED: See where drivers will pit for Sunday’s race

History tells 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.

Michael McDowell's No. 71 Chevy dives into Turn 1 at the Chicago Street Course
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.

MORE: Lineup advice in Fantasy Fastlane

Speed reads

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

Bubba Wallace's No. 23 maneuvers on the main straight at the Chicago Street Course
Alejandro Alvarez | NASCAR Digital Media
Posted on by Reid Spencer

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.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos 

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.

Posted on by Staff Report

All four Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolets will start from the rear for Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race on the Chicago Street Course (2 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) due to incidents sustained in practice and qualifying on Saturday.

RELATED: Starting lineup | At-track photos

The four-car fleet joined a sizable list of 10 cars that will drop to the rear during pace laps, according to NASCAR competition officials. Of those, nine will drop to the back for unapproved adjustments. The No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota for Denny Hamlin will fall to the rear because of an engine change, stemming from an issue that halted his on-track time just minutes into opening practice.

The full list of teams dropping to the rear of the field:

  • No. 4 Front Row Motorsports Ford, driver Noah Gragson
  • No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, driver Kyle Larson
  • No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, driver Chase Elliott
  • No. 10 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet, driver Ty Dillon
  • No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, driver Denny Hamlin
  • No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota, driver Bubba Wallace
  • No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, driver William Byron
  • No. 47 Hyak Motorsports Chevrolet, driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
  • No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, driver Alex Bowman
  • No. 78 Live Fast Motorsports Chevrolet, driver Katherine Legge

Byron posted the fastest time in Group 1 practice, but with less than two minutes remaining, the No. 24 machine hit the outside wall in Turn 10. In an interview with truTV, Byron explained that he carried too much speed into the corner and consequently suffered heavy left-rear damage. Byron did not turn a lap in qualifying as the team repaired its primary car.

In Group 2 practice, Elliott hit the wall in the short chute between Turns 3 and 4, just after the long back straightaway and past a heavy braking zone. He suffered left-side damage and, like Byron, did not turn a qualifying lap.

Bowman caught the wall and suffered suspension damage later in Group 2 practice. The No. 48 car turned a qualifying lap to better pit selection and posted the 11th-fastest time, but the team elected to repair the car before Sunday’s 75-lap race.

MORE: Full Saturday recap

Larson qualified 14th but sustained damage during his run. Like Bowman, the No. 5 team chose to repair the car and forfeit starting position.

Byron, Elliott and Larson own the top three spots in Cup Series points with five combined victories this season, including a win last weekend at EchoPark Speedway (formerly known as Atlanta Motor Speedway) for Elliott. Bowman, the defending winner in Chicago, is 12th in points.

Posted on by Reid Spencer

CHICAGO — After upsetting top-seeded Denny Hamlin in the first round of the In-Season Challenge last Saturday at EchoPark Speedway (formerly Atlanta Motor Speedway), Ty Dillon fired the parting shot heard around the NASCAR world.

“For all you Denny fans out there, I just knocked your favorite driver out,” Dillon said, borrowing a turn of phrase Hamlin himself made famous.

Dillon, the 32nd seed, acknowledged Saturday that he had planned the trash talk after Hamlin wrecked out of the Atlanta race on Lap 69.

RELATED: In-Season Challenge hub | Dillon talks In-Season Challenge battle with Hamlin

“It was planned when I knew he was eliminated,” Dillon said. “When I knew we had him, I told (pit reporter) Mamba (Smith) for the interview, I said, ‘Hey, give me a second after this interview, I got something to say.’

“So, somewhat spontaneous, I guess you could call it that, but it was there. It was always there, and I just wanted to lean into it a little bit.”

Dillon will face 17th-seeded Brad Keselowski in the second round on the Chicago Street Course, and he likes his chances against the 2012 NASCAR Cup Series champion.

“Honestly, I feel good,” Dillon said. “We’re going to do our best starting today and all through the race tomorrow to put pressure on him. This is a place that, if you feel like you can pressure people, they can make mistakes.

“Obviously, you’re seeing in practice in Xfinity cars, a little bit more (aggression) can get you in a lot of trouble. And I enjoy road-course racing. We ran really good in Mexico City, another one of the races that we ran up front. A lot of people credit it to being good in the rain, but we also ran really well when it turned dry, too.”

MORE: Chicago schedule | How to watch NASCAR on TNT Sports, truTV

Dillon and the rest of the Cup Series field will tackle the street course on Sunday in the Grant Park 165 (2 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Cup and Xfinity series head to the Great Lakes this weekend for a stop at the Chicago Street Course for the third time. Bookmark this page and come back often for your race-week essentials — from links to qualifying order, average practice speeds, results and more.

RELATED: Full weekend schedule

NASCAR Cup Series

Race day: Sunday at 2 p.m. ET on TNT Sports. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information becomes available.

Tires: Six sets for the race (five race sets plus one set transferred from qualifying). Teams also have one set for practice, plus six total rain sets for the weekend, if needed. 

Entry List
Qualifying Order
Practice Results
Practice Lap Averages
Practice Lap Times
Qualifying Results
Pit Stalls
Stage 1 Results
Stage 2 Results
Race Results

NASCAR Xfinity Series

Race day: Saturday at 4:30 p.m. ET on The CW. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information becomes available.

Tires: Four sets for the race (three race sets plus one set transferred from qualifying). Teams also have two sets for practice, plus four total rain sets for the weekend, if needed. 

Entry List
Qualifying Order
Practice Results
Practice Lap Averages
Practice Lap Times
Qualifying Results
Pit Stalls
Stage 1 Results
Stage 2 Results
Race Results