Logan Riely/Getty Images
Van Gisbergen stays king of the streets with Chicago Cup Series pole
Shane van Gisbergen continues to set the standard on NASCAR's road and street courses.
The Kiwi, who made his NASCAR debut with a win on the streets of Chicago in 2023, will lead the field to the green flag this Sunday after recording a pole lap of 88.338mph (89.656s).
It is the third pole of van Gisbergen’s career. He won from the pole in Mexico City last month.
“That was epic,” van Gisbergen said. “The guys did a great job. The WeatherTech Chevy is really good. I’m a lucky boy; I’ve got some great cars today. Xfinity pole, Cup pole. The Cup pole is pretty special. I’m looking forward to the race tomorrow, but what a tune-up.
“Practice wasn’t that great and went out in qualifying. The car felt really good and laid down two pretty good laps.”
Michael McDowell qualified second at 87.879mph, Carson Hocevar third at 87.824mph, Tyler Reddick fourth at 87.779mph and Chase Briscoe completed the top five at 87.734mph. Kyle Busch qualified sixth at 87.639mph, Ryan Preece seventh at 87.481mph, Chris Buescher eighth at 87.471mph, Ty Gibbs ninth at 87.391mph and Austin Dillon rounded out the top 10 at 87.303mph.
The defending race winner, Alex Bowman, qualified 11th. Joey Logano, Christopher Bell, Kyle Larson, and Brad Keselowski completed the top 15.
Will Brown qualified 19th for his second Cup Series start. He was the fastest of the Open teams entered in the race.
Bubba Wallace had multiple issues in qualifying that put him 37th on the grid. He spun during one attempt, and then spun again and bounced off the tire barriers in a separate incident.
Katherine Legge earned the final spot on the grid of the five Open teams who entered the event. Legge and Live Fast Motorsports out-qualified Corey Heim of 23XI Racing.
“I was thinking, ‘Way to go showing all my minor indiscretions there,’” Legge said of the highlight reel of her qualifying attempt, which included bouncing off the walls. “I tried my best to mess that qualifying up, honestly. I think it was a lot of pressure to come in with only 20 minutes of practice on a street course where there is no room for error to try and put it in the show. But I actually feel pretty good about it now having done that.
“We would have been a lot faster, I think, had I not kept nicking the walls. I’ve given my crew a lot of work to do. Sorry, guys. I just had to keep pushing and put it in the show, which we did, so I’m very proud of them and I’m very much looking forward to tomorrow and a little bit less stress.”
There will be multiple big-name drivers coming from the rear of the field on Sunday, including three who were unable to make a qualifying lap.
William Byron and Chase Elliott were sidelined after hitting the wall in practice and requiring repairs. Denny Hamlin did not get on track after blowing an engine.
NEXT: The Grant Park 165 at 2 p.m. ET Sunday.
Kelly Crandall
Kelly has been on the NASCAR beat full-time since 2013, and joined RACER as chief NASCAR writer in 2017. Her work has also appeared in NASCAR.com, the NASCAR Illustrated magazine, and NBC Sports. A corporate communications graduate from Central Penn College, Crandall is a two-time George Cunningham Writer of the Year recipient from the National Motorsports Press Association.
Read Kelly Crandall's articles
Latest News
Comments
Comments are disabled until you accept Social Networking Cookies. Update cookie preferences
If the dialog doesn't appear, ad-blockers are often the cause; try disabling yours or see our Social Features Support.