Shane van Gisbergen will let others decide for themselves if his speed Saturday on the streets of Chicago in a NASCAR Cup Series car was a surprise.
The three-time Supercars champion admitted he’s “surprised” after he was fastest in practice in the Trackhouse Racing PROJECT91 car before qualifying third. He was knocked from the provisional pole in the waning moments of qualifying by Denny Hamlin and Tyler Reddick.
“No,” van Gisbergen did not expect to be that quick. “I felt comfortable and prep’s been good this week — done a lot of simulator and data study, watching on boards. I’ve done as much prep as I can. But yeah, the track was crazy. I’ve never driven a street track so bumpy, and it was pretty tough.”
The plan was for van Gisbergen to work his way up to speed and aggression level when cars got on track for the first time. Those plans changed when he found himself surrounded by series regulars who paid no mind to the newcomer.
“I thought I would take it easy, but everyone was just flat out,” van Gisbergen said. “I had Austin Dillon, I think it is, just bomb me early on, and it was like a full race, so I tried to find my own piece of track and build up on my own pace.
“Everyone was wild. It was pretty cool. If that’s anything like the race is going to be like, it’s going to be full on.”
It was still an “awesome” Saturday, finally getting on track. Van Gisbergen arrived at the Trackhouse Racing shop in Concord, North Carolina, before the race last weekend at Nashville Superspeedway to begin his preparation for his debut.
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In addition to getting fitted and going through the necessary steps at the race shop, the Kiwi had time on the simulator and attended the Nashville race with Trackhouse to take in how NASCAR races play out and learn team dynamics. Earlier this week, he got a short test on the Charlotte Roval.
“It’s been a lot of anticipation and then anticipation for everyone,” van Gisbergen said. “Nobody knew what it was going to be like. It was cool to finally see it all happen. The crowd will be big tomorrow; I think it’s really cool.”
Although the Next Gen car has been compared to a sports car and even close to a Australian Supercar, van Gisbergen said they are “very different.”
“You feel the weight of the car a lot when it slides; it really lets go,” he said. “I had a few moments and it’s difficult here. I was losing a lot of time (under braking) on the data. It’s so intimidating here because there’s no runoff, there’s just a wall in front of you.
“I didn’t really have confidence to make up the time on the brakes, so I need to keep building up to that tomorrow. And just speaking with Daniel (Suarez), my teammate, he changed the bias a bit different to me. Yeah, I got a bit to learn. I was learning every lap trying to push, and it was a lot of fun.”
Entering the weekend, van Gisbergen shared he had no expectations for his debut but wanted to race with respect and felt optimistic about a good day given the work put in to get there. Now after seeing the speed in his car, he still isn’t changing his approach.
“Well, I think people were getting quicker and quicker, and the track was ramping up,” he said. “Every run was so much faster, so we just got to make sure we keep doing that and make sure our car is still good (when the track is) fully gripped tomorrow.”