Australian Supercars champion Shane van Gisbergen (SVG) may not have known how to tackle stock car races on oval tracks a year back but he does now. The New Zealander, who is now an Xfinity Series regular, finished in fourth place at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s 2.5-mile oval layout on Saturday. This represents his second-best finish on an oval track since flying to the U.S.
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SVG was beginning to be known as a driver only good on road course races. In fairness, he was. He secured back-to-back road course victories earlier this year and made a big dent on the leaderboard. But the primary purpose of his spending time in the second tier was to level up his game on ovals. The journey that he has undergone to do that hasn’t been an easy one.
He told the press last month, “The ovals are very, very, very difficult. But I feel like I’m getting better and better, finishing the races with straight cars and starting to get more and more competitive. Road courses are (my) strength, but I don’t know if ovals are a weakness.” His result in Indianapolis proves that they indeed aren’t a weakness.
A proper understanding of the tracks and the requirements to perform on them is what has helped him make particular demands from his crew and elevate results. He underlined the same on the pit road after the race. “To run 4th here is really cool. We were about fifth before we took tires, it was fun to come through there on fresh tires,” he said.
SVG doesn’t want to lose momentum
SVG started his race from 23rd place but made huge ground by escaping an opening lap wreck that collected 12 cars. He shot his No. 97 Kaulig Racing car into the top 10 and stayed there through the first two stages before gaining positions to enter the top 5. Though a late caution deterred his progress, he made it a momentary hurdle and flew through the ranks once again to finish fourth.
His third-place finish in Atlanta remains his best record on ovals so far. The sport will be taking a three-week break now in parallel with the 2024 Paris Olympics. While many would appreciate this breather, SVG wishes that they could keep going so that he can make maximum use of the momentum that he has earned.
His next race will be at the Michigan International Speedway on August 18.
