When you win nearly one-sixth of the 36 races in a NASCAR Cup season, most drivers would consider that a great season. A championship-worthy season, as a matter of fact. Well, that answer would be yes and no for Shane Van Gisbergen, who earned his fifth road course win on Sunday at the Charlotte Roval.
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However, in a sense, the victory came in a losing cause, as he was eliminated from the Cup playoffs three races ago after the opening Round of 16.
The best Van Gisbergen can hope to finish this season is 13th. Still, the New Zealand native is slowly but surely improving on ovals, which make up the lion’s share of the Cup schedule.
Once the former three-time Australian V8 Supercars champion fully gets the hang of ovals — and he has definitely shown improvement this year compared to last season — SVG is going to become “very dangerous,” as his boss, Trackhouse owner Justin Marks, said after Van Gisbergen’s win at Charlotte on Sunday.
“I think it’s still just time,” SVG said of what he still needs during his post-race press conference. “I feel like every race weekend I’m learning something. Even on a road course.”
Van Gisbergen was a spoiler on Sunday Sunday, helping to knock four drivers out of contention for further advancement into the Round of Eight, which begins next Sunday in Las Vegas. SVG is hoping he can continue in the same trajectory in the final four races of the season, while also getting better on all four ovals (Las Vegas, Talladega, Martinsville and the season finale at Phoenix).
“These next few weeks are a contrast of tracks,” Van Gisbergen added. “All three tracks [in the Round of Eight, but that can be extrapolated to include the one-mile flat track at Phoenix] are very different from each other.”
“That’s the hard part where you’ve got to transition from the mile-and-a-half (Las Vegas) to the short track (Martinsville) or superspeedway (Talladega). It’s going to be a pretty crazy finish to the year. But, yeah, I need to be better at all disciplines of what NASCAR Cup racing is. That will help us do better in the playoffs next year.”
SVG Is Already Planning for Next Year’s Playoffs
You have to like that kind of confidence, where SVG is already predicting he’ll make the playoffs again in 2026. “Yeah, I really think we are getting a lot better, but we needed to execute, and we didn’t in the playoffs,” he continued.
And while the Trackhouse Racing driver still has a way to go, he’s confident that he will continue to get better with each subsequent Cup race.
“I think my learning curve is still pretty steep,” he admitted. “I feel like as a driver I’m getting more comfortable and understanding the car dynamics, the setup every week.
“I feel like I’m always learning. So, yeah, as long as that doesn’t stop, I’ll keep getting better.” And then maybe his initials may have to be switched from SVG to SVD: “Shane’s Very Dangerous.”
