Recent results prove NASCAR was the right move – van Gisbergen

Shane van Gisbergen still has half a season left in his first full year of NASCAR Cup Series competition, but the last four weeks have already justified his career change.

Van Gisbergen has won two of the last four races at the Mexico City road course and the Chicago street course. A pair of victories has him clinched in the postseason as a rookie, and one victory shy of being tied for the most in the series. The victory in Chicago made him the winningest foreign-born driver in Cup Series history, and he became the fastest driver since Jimmie Johnson in 2002 to win three races in his first 33 starts.

And all of this because van Gisbergen decided in 2023 to leave a highly-successful career in Australian Supercars to live and compete in the premier stock car series in the United States.

“It justifies, or backs up, why we’ve done it and why Justin [Marks] believes in me,” van Gisbergen said this week. “Justin looks like the smartest guy here after me locking into the playoffs, especially how dismal it looked early in the year. We all kept that belief. 

“Yeah, I feel like I made the best decision ever. I was really hating racing in Australia. I hated driving those cars. Now, I’ve never had so much fun racing, going to the racetrack every single weekend. I really love what I do.”

The success van Gisbergen is having on the road and street courses is to be expected, and it’s where Marks and the sponsors for van Gisbergen are getting their return on investment. But Marks still believes that van Gisbergen, 36, will develop into the complete package of a race car driver who can get the job done on ovals as well as road and street courses. Ovals, of course, make up the majority of the NASCAR schedule, whereas there are six road/street courses. 

Van Gisbergen isn’t exaggerating when he uses the word “dismal” to describe how his season started on the ovals. In the first nine oval races of the season (through Talladega in April), van Gisbergen had an average finish of 30.44 with a best finish of 20th at Darlington Raceway.

In the last seven oval races, however, van Gisbergen has improved his average finish to 22nd. His best finish is now a 14th in the Coca-Cola 600. 

“[Marks is] obviously very patient with me and knows that I’ll get there,” van Gisbergen said. “Obviously, I’ve had to deliver road course results to offset that a little bit, but he’s done what I’m doing. He was a NASCAR driver himself after being a sports car racer, and he knows how difficult this sport is. So he knows what I’m going through, and when I talk with him about my struggles, he knows what I’m talking about. It’s pretty cool to have a boss like that.”

Ovals are a work in progress for van Gisbergen, and that does include feeling like he’s doing a little more work than usual to try and get up to speed at those tracks. 

“Yes and no,” he said. “It’s just comfort. New experiences are always hard. When I went back to Darlington this year for the second time, I struggled there in the Southern 500 (in 2024), but in the race this year, I bent the car in practice, so we qualified badly. But in the race, we just got better and better as we went. It’s just when something is not new to you anymore, you’re more comfortable in that environment. I’m driving the same car every week with the same people, whereas last year I was chugging and changing. 

“This year is comfortable and I’m learning so much more.” 

Van Gisbergen will go for a season-tying third victory Sunday at Sonoma Raceway. A triumph would be a back-to-back feat for him and the No. 88 team.