Denny Hamlin’s Reality Check on Shane van Gisbergen’s NASCAR Dominance Echoed by the Kiwi: “That Would Take a Long Time”

Shane van Gisbergen made a statement when he blazed through the street course at Chicago’s Grant Park 220 on his way to winning the race, leaving every other NASCAR driver in the shadows. Recently when he was asked about racing on the ovals, Gisbergen mentioned how he would perform on a staple NASCAR track. Following his revelation, Denny Hamlin’s previous justification regarding SVG’s win at Chicago started making sense.

Hamlin believed that given that SVG comes from a format of racing where there are enough street courses he would obviously ace it compared to NASCAR drivers who have never raced at such a track.

Shane van Gisbergen shares his thoughts on racing in Ovals

While he was fast down the streets of Chicago, the same might not be the case if he heads down to the Ovals in the Cup Series, considering that he has next to no experience with that format of racing. Recently, Gisbergen mentioned that he would take a while to adjust to racing at the oval track formats and that he had no illusions of running up top in that situation.

Gisbergen stated, “The oval is a completely different world. I have no illusion that I’d go there and run up the front; that would take a long time. Obviously, you want to try, but having six to eight road courses in the coming years, that’s appealing.”

His thoughts basically confirmed Denny Hamlin’s previous comments about why he was so good at Grant Park 220.

Denny Hamlin was right about the reason for SVG’s dominance at Chicago

Over the years Gisbergen has raced at places like Mount Panorama at Bathurst and Adelaide Parklands Circuit. Given the nature of some of the tracks, Chicago proved to be pretty easy for him. Meanwhile, the other drivers out on the track, who have been racing on the ovals all their life, literally walked into the race blind.

Speaking earlier on his podcast, Hamlin had mentioned that the NASCAR drivers had stepped into Gisbergen’s world and not the other way around. His comments came after drivers such as Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson had mentioned how the Kiwi had put them in a bad place after beating them at their own game.

What Hamlin reinforced was the fact that SVG was familiar with street courses, meanwhile, NASCAR drivers were familiar with ovals and road courses. Hence, the Hendrick Motorsports driver’s comments would not be a fair comparison.