NASCAR takeaways: Shane van Gisbergen grabs historic win in Chicago

CHICAGO — Shane van Gisbergen had never been to Chicago except for a layover in the airport.

He owned the city streets Sunday night.

The three-time Australian V8 Supercars champion won the first-ever NASCAR Cup Series street-course race, becoming the first Cup driver in 60 years to win a points race in his Cup debut. 

“I don’t know how to put it into words,” van Gisbergen said. “What an amazing day.”

On fresher tires, van Gisbergen passed Justin Haley on the overtime restart — NASCAR reduced the scheduled race length from 100 to 75 laps during the race as it became obvious they wouldn’t get the rain-delayed event done before darkness — in an event that went 78 laps.

Chase Elliott finished third, followed by Kyle Larson and Kyle Busch.

Takeaways from the Chicago street race:

Big Upset for Project91

Trackhouse Racing fields its No. 91 car just for a few races a year as part of what it calls “Project91” to bring internationally known racers to NASCAR.

The 34-year-old from New Zealand had never competed in NASCAR but Justin Marks wanted him because the current Cup car is relatively similar to a Supercar.

“You always dream of it, but these guys are good,” van Gisbergen said about what he thought about his chances. “The drivers are very good now on road courses. I was always confident. I knew the equipment was good, the team is awesome and I just had to do the job.”

Early in the race, van Gisbergen got passed by two drivers because he wasn’t aggressive enough. He was 18th on Lap 52 but with fresher tires than many, he worked his way through the field to challenge for the win.

“I was too nice to people,” van Gisbergen said about his getting passed early. “As the race went on, I got more comfortable and got more aware of how the drivers race and how much room they give.

“It was hard coming back through (the field]. I didn’t really know who the people were. … I was just trying to push through.”

He left the other competitors impressed.

“He’s going to go home and tell all his friends how bad we are,” Elliott said. “That was a clinic.”

Haley One Spot Short

Haley, who is 23rd in the standings, nearly pulled off his own upset, but he didn’t think he could hold off van Gisbergen.

“What are you going to do?” Haley said. “He had 16-lap fresher tires. … What is there to be disappointed about?”

Haley won a rain-shortened race at Daytona in 2019 when he stayed out and everyone else pitted before a storm ended the race.

“I don’t feel like it was a complete loss,” Haley said. “We still finished second. But I definitely wish I would have been better. But that just comes down to being in that position more often.”

NASCAR Gets It In

It appeared the race wouldn’t happen Sunday because of heavy storms with a few inches of rain, but NASCAR was able to get the standing water off the track and get started with the cars on rain tires.

NASCAR changed all the restarts to single-file restarts but beyond that there wasn’t much different — except for the decision to cut the race to 75 laps.

That hurt some drivers who had not pitted before NASCAR made the decision, so that put 11 cars out in front of Christopher Bell, who had been the leader all day and swept the opening two stages. Bell got caught up in a couple of wrecks and saw a potential win slip away.

It allowed Haley, Elliott and Busch to finish in the top 5.

“A decent result considering how bad of a job I feel like I did for the past 48 hours,” said Elliott, who crashed his primary car in qualifying and then also hit a tire barrier during the race.

Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including the past 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass, and sign up for the FOX Sports NASCAR Newsletter with Bob Pockrass.

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