- Shane van Gisbergen bags his second Watkins Glen win.
- SVG delivers the first win of the season for both himself and Trackhouse Racing.
- His crew chief admits they deliberately kept SVG in attack mode.
As many expected, Watkins Glen once again turned into a Shane van Gisbergen show, with the New Zealander returning to the road course and once more leaving the field chasing shadows. Yet beneath the headline result, another story was modeled altogether, one that revealed the rest of the garage may finally be beginning to chop away at the gap that has separated SVG from the pack on road courses.
Last season, when SVG stormed past Christopher Bell for the win at The Glen, he crossed the stripe a staggering 11.116 seconds ahead. This time, after outdueling both the field and Michael McDowell, the margin shrank to 7.288 seconds. In racing terms, that still counts as a country mile. But compared to last year, the garage at least managed to keep the rabbit somewhere within eyesight.
Even then, the win hardly arrived gift-wrapped. SVG had to claw back nearly 30 seconds after dropping deep in the order following the final sequence of pit stops.
Shane van Gisbergen overcame a 30-second deficit to Ty Gibbs
Shane van Gisbergen started from pole position alongside Michael McDowell, while Austin Cindric slipped backward early as Connor Zilisch surged into third place behind the Trackhouse pair. Once the green flag dropped, SVG did not waste any time planting his foot and stretching the lead by several seconds over the field.
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. provided an early scare after launching through the muddy grass exiting the bus stop chicane, though he escaped without damage. With teams already looking several moves ahead on strategy, many drivers opted to short-pit before the end of Stage 1, including SVG himself.
Ross Chastain stayed out and cashed in for the stage victory, while the scrap for the final stage point nearly turned into a demolition derby as McDowell, Herbst, and Bubba Wallace barreled toward the line three-wide.
Wallace came up short, while several others sacrificed track position in hopes of grabbing points and wound up empty-handed, including Chase Elliott.
Joey Logano finished P2 at the end of Stage 1, followed by Ryan Blaney, Austin Cindric, AJ Allmendinger, Christopher Bell, John Hunter Nemechek, SVG, Riley Herbst, and McDowell.
Although SVG slipped back to finish Stage 1 in eighth, he returned to the front in Stage 2. On the restart, SVG resumed command of the race, though Zilisch stalked him through much of the stage.
Then chaos descended again with 10 laps remaining in the stage when a tent or canopy from the campground blew onto the racing surface, forcing NASCAR to wave the caution. Watkins Glen already had mud, soaked campgrounds, and stranded campers. Naturally, airborne camping equipment joined the circus, too.
Shane van Gisbergen pitted from the lead, and most of the field followed him down pit road, though six drivers stayed out: McDowell, Daniel Suárez, Bell, Wallace, Herbst, and Nemechek.
The restart erupted into bedlam. Riley Herbst spun entering Turn 1, while in the bus stop chicane, William Byron looped around, and Ryan Blaney slammed into him, damaging both machines. Todd Gilliland also spun in the melee, while Zilisch lost positions after bailing through the grass to avoid disaster. Byron eventually returned to the pit road and lost several laps.
Christopher Bell then missed the bus stop entirely and was forced to stop, ending any hope of collecting stage points.
SVG reclaimed the lead and won Stage 2 ahead of Tyler Reddick, Ty Gibbs, Austin Dillon, Kyle Busch, Chris Buescher, Austin Cindric, Connor Zilisch, Chase Briscoe, and Bubba Wallace, who edged Ross Chastain by barely a nose at the green-and-white checkered.
McDowell, meanwhile, tumbled outside the top 10 and walked away from a top-three run without any stage points to show for it.
SVG lined up alongside Tyler Reddick for the Stage 3 restart. But before the field could settle in, Joey Logano slowed with a flat tire and scattered tire carcass debris onto the track, triggering another caution just outside the fuel window.
SVG and Reddick stayed out while most of the field peeled onto pit road. Twelve cars remained on track, while Ty Gibbs led the group that chose fresh tires from 13th position.
When the race resumed, SVG once again hit the gas and disappeared into the distance while Allmendinger stole second from Reddick. Gibbs charged forward into the top five, with Zilisch following close behind.
As the final stage started, Gibbs climbed to second while SVG stretched the lead beyond five seconds.
Then came the moment that flipped the race upside down.
With 25 laps remaining, SVG pitted from the lead, handing control of the race to Gibbs. SVG rejoined the race buried in 25th place, trailing the leader by roughly 30 seconds.
For most drivers, the deficit would have spelled doom. But for SVG, it merely became another target.
Lap after lap, SVG hacked away at the gap before finally reclaiming the lead with seven laps remaining. Once he reached clean air, the race was over in all but paperwork. He drove away from the field and sealed back-to-back victories at Watkins Glen.
What did SVG say after the race?
SVG could barely contain his excitement after climbing from the car, praising both the No. 97 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet and the strategy calls that helped drag him back into contention.
“Unbelievable to win with (the No.) 97. We weren’t very good in practice, and then qualifying was amazing, and then today, what a race car. Then [crew chief] Stephen [Doran] made great calls. I wasn’t sure how it was going to work, and then to run them down like that, it’s very, very special to do two in a row,” SVG said.
“Just stoked for these guys, you know, to execute every facet of our game. Speechless. This is so cool.”
Crew chief Stephen Doran later explained that the team deliberately kept SVG in attack mode throughout the race.
“He’s made it pretty clear, especially at these tracks, he likes to be on offense, so we put him there and just let him go do his thing,” Doran said.
The triumph arrived one day after rookie teammate Connor Zilisch captured a win in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race. Zilisch, however, could only manage a 20th-place finish on Sunday after suffering a tire issue late in the race.
Still, the weekend marked a breakthrough showing for Trackhouse Racing. All three of the organization’s cars qualified inside the top five after the team managed only four top-10 finishes through the opening 11 races of the season.
Zilisch, who started from P5 before fading to P20, admitted frustration over the missed opportunity.
“Just frustrating because we had a really good day going. At worst, we were going to get ourselves our first top five and walk out of here with something. But congrats to Shane, Trackhouse, and everybody who makes this happen,” Zilisch said.
