Van Gisbergen learning NASCAR ropes by ‘driving a forklift’
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Alanis King, Racing columnist
Last summer, three-time Australian Supercars champion Shane van Gisbergen shocked the NASCAR world by winning his debut in the top-level Cup Series. It was the first time anyone had done so in 60 years, and it kicked off his whirlwind of a career change: moving to the United States to pursue NASCAR full time.
This summer, he’s four months into his tour as a full-time driver in the second-tier Xfinity Series, where he’s preparing for his eventual move to Cup. What has he learned about the car so far?
“Sometimes it feels like you’re driving a forklift,” he told ESPN.
Van Gisbergen’s NASCAR switch is fascinating for many reasons, including the car. His debut NASCAR victory came on the Chicago Street Course, which he ran with Trackhouse Racing’s “Project91” team, a part-time star car for drivers from other series. It was the perfect storm: It was NASCAR’s first time at a street course, and it happened in the rain — two things that come naturally for Van Gisbergen. That helped level the playing field between him and the drivers who race NASCAR every week.
The Chicago race was meant to be a one-off, and Van Gisbergen told ESPN that he didn’t expect to win, but “stuff just snowballed so quickly” after he did. He soon signed a development contract with Trackhouse, which included running the 2024 season with Kaulig Racing in Xfinity to adapt to NASCAR’s oval-heavy schedule.
“I had the perfect opportunity to come in and be on a reasonably equal playing field at Chicago, since street circuits are sort of my deal,” Van Gisbergen said. “America’s a massive place, and there are so many young, talented drivers coming through. It’s hard for people to come over here and break into it, so I’m pretty lucky.”
Perhaps the biggest factor in Van Gisbergen’s win was the new Cup Series race car, called the “Next Gen,” which debuted in 2022. It’s less like old NASCAR cars (built to go fast and turn left) and more like a sports car (built to go fast, plus turn left and right), making it easier for non-NASCAR drivers to be competitive.
That adaptability hasn’t trickled down to NASCAR’s top development leagues. So while Van Gisbergen adjusts to the NASCAR schedule in Xfinity, he’s doing so in a totally unfamiliar car — and he’s already won in it twice.
“[I’ve learned] a huge amount of things, like just how funky the Xfinity car is to drive,” he said. “The biggest thing is that the Cup car, it feels like a race car. It feels like every other car I’ve driven around the world, with the aero and the rear end. It’s a huge evolution of a NASCAR, I guess, to go the whole different route that they have. Even on the oval, it kind of feels like a normal car.
“Whereas the Xfinity car, it’s only specific to oval racing, basically. The style of car that has been designed and developed for years, that NASCAR type of stock car. The rear end is really, really interesting, how it moves around. I’ve never driven a car like that.”
Since the arrival of the Next Gen, the NASCAR Xfinity and Cup cars are fundamentally different vehicles. The Xfinity car is old-school NASCAR: 15-inch wheels with five lug nuts each, a solid rear axle, and a four-speed manual transmission. The Next Gen car is in line with the rest of the world: 18-inch wheels with large single lug nuts, an independent rear suspension and a five-speed sequential transmission.
Those changes manifest themselves in many ways. When talking about the old Cup car versus the new one last year, 23XI Racing Cup Series driver Tyler Reddick told me the new car is especially durable on road courses.
“Where a lot of drivers would have issues under braking with the [last] car was with the old-school truck arms, and just how much those flex and wheel hop,” Reddick said. “Once you had axle hop — wheel hop — you were more than likely crashing. The more you had that axle hop, if you didn’t crash the car, you would just shake all the parts loose. You had to really go into the approach of: ‘If I’m going to push this car, I’m going to save it for the end of the race, because I don’t want to just rip the car apart.’
“With the Next Gen car, that’s totally different. With independent rear suspension, all the beefy suspension parts it has, you don’t really have situations where the car falls apart like the other car did. You can launch it across curbs as hard as you want.”
Van Gisbergen’s first Xfinity win came at Portland International Raceway earlier this month. On the first lap, the wheel hop got him.
“I got into Sam Mayer,” he said. “The rear end just starts locking up and doing whatever it does. It’s certainly an interesting thing. I haven’t really felt that in many cars, so it’s weird, to say the least.”
But the car is only one challenge in Van Gisbergen’s NASCAR switch. Another is the tracks; he comes from a background of sports cars, endurance racing, rally and more, but much of the NASCAR season happens on ovals.
So far, both of Van Gisbergen’s Xfinity wins are on road courses. He has an average finish of 15.7 so far this season, and on ovals, his best result so far is third in Atlanta.
“The ovals are very, very, very difficult,” Van Gisbergen said. “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. We’re obviously not running at the very front, but getting better and better and learning a lot. So it’s kind of about where we expect it to be.”
One of the main voices in Van Gisbergen’s decision to come Stateside was Marcos Ambrose, who moved to NASCAR as a Supercars champion nearly 20 years ago. He was always a standout on road courses in the Cup Series, even with the old car, but ovals didn’t come as easily.
Right now, Van Gisbergen thinks he just needs time to adapt.
“I’ve had some great people helping me, with Kevin Harvick and Marcos Ambrose, and then my teammates A.J. [Allmendinger] and Josh [Williams] as well,” he said. “They’re always open to anything I ever ask.
“A.J.’s a good yardstick. He’s obviously capable of winning on the ovals, and we’re in the same equipment. If I can be matching him or running near what he’s doing in the races, that can only be a good thing. I’m trying to learn what he’s doing with the car to make it faster to try and match him.”
Van Gisbergen’s NASCAR switch is compelling on a number of levels. He’s 35 years old, around the age when longtime NASCAR drivers near their performance peak, and he had a career for the history books overseas. If he’d continued that career, he would’ve been a threat to win Supercars championships for years to come.
Instead, he’s giving himself a new challenge in America. He told ESPN that his Chicago performance probably makes NASCAR more appealing for other drivers, but that once they get here, “it’s certainly not easy.”
“Everyone here is very, very good,” Van Gisbergen said. “They’ve been doing these tracks for so long, and driving these cars every week. It’s been a huge change and challenge in life, moving here and the career. It’s been a lot of new skills to learn. But most of all, it’s been a lot of fun.”
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Greg Wyshynski
After the New Jersey Devils saw their season end in double overtime Tuesday night, goaltender Jacob Markstrom wanted to express his frustration via his stick. He thought about boomeranging it to the boards. Instead, he swung it hard against his goalpost, breaking it in half.
Sebastian Aho‘s goal at 4:17 of the second overtime in Game 5 gave the Carolina Hurricanes a 5-4 win and a 4-1 series victory over the Devils. It was the first puck Markstrom had fly by him in 37 consecutive shots on goal, dating to the second period. That included 18 saves he made in overtime, as Carolina marauded a short-handed and exhausted Devils defense but couldn’t solve the 35-year-old goalie.
“That was one of the better goaltending performances that I’ve witnessed,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said of Markstrom, who finished with 49 saves. “He let in a few early that he’d like to have back. But once he got dialed in, you’re thinking it’ll have to bank off somebody, because we’re not beating him.”
Markstrom’s frustration wasn’t just with the overtime goal. The Devils built a 3-0 lead in the first period. Carolina scored three times in the first 5:40 of the second period to erase it. New Jersey responded with a Nico Hischier goal, only to have Aho knot the score at 4 moments later.
“We put up four goals on the road,” Markstrom said. “We should have brought it home. It should have been enough.”
But as his teammates noted, Markstrom’s effort in the overtimes should have been enough to win Game 5.
“We were under siege. He was outstanding. We were reeling,” coach Sheldon Keefe said.
“He played unbelievable. Marky kept us in that first overtime,” Hischier said. “I feel bad for him because he battled his ass off.”
Markstrom was acquired by the Devils last offseason in a high-profile deal with the Calgary Flames that was intended to fix the team’s goaltending, which ranked 30th in 2023-24. He won 26 times in 49 games with a .900 save percentage and a 2.50 goals-against average. He was outstanding, for the most part, in the playoffs: .911 save percentage and a 2.78 goals-against average in five games.
But Markstrom couldn’t overcome two things in the postseason for the Devils. The first were their injuries. Already without star center Jack Hughes, who had season-ending shoulder surgery, the Devils saw defensemen Luke Hughes, Johnathan Kovacevic and Brenden Dillon leave the series with injuries, with defensemen Jonas Siegenthaler and Dougie Hamilton playing at less than 100%.
“We had a few guys go down in the series. A few guys step up and battle. We’ve got to get better. We don’t like the result,” forward Timo Meier said.
The other factor was the Devils special teams. Their power play was officially 0-for-15. Their penalty kill allowed six goals on 19 Carolina power plays.
“That’s why we lost the series for sure. We couldn’t get the power play going. That’s on those guys, including me, that are on the ice. That’s definitely frustrating,” Hischier said.
But the Devils gutted out the series, pushing Carolina to double overtime in an elimination game despite those deficiencies.
“There’s a lot of will in this room,” Markstrom said. “It sucks right now.”
ARLINGTON, Texas — Everything came together in the same game for two-time Cy Young Award winner Jacob deGrom and the Texas Rangers batters.
Texas had a much-needed offensive breakout while deGrom struck out seven over six scoreless innings for his first win in more than two years, though he had pitched well enough to win in several other starts this season.
“When was the last one, ’23? Yeah, it’s been a while,” deGrom said after the Rangers’ 15-2 win over the Athletics on Tuesday night.
“He earned it. He had great stuff tonight, he kept us on our toes,” second baseman Marcus Semien said. “We were just talking about how the time of possession was. You know, we were hitting for a long time and he’s getting quick outs. So usually that’s a good recipe.”
The 36-year-old deGrom (1-1) had gone 737 days since also beating the A’s on April 23, 2023, then made only one more start in his debut season with Texas before Tommy John surgery.
He scattered four singles and didn’t walk a batter in a 65-pitch outing (47 strikes). It was only that short since the right-hander didn’t return after an eight-run outburst in the Rangers sixth that matched their previous season high for runs in an entire game and put them up 12-0.
So just how efficient was deGrom? The right-hander honestly thought he was “probably in the 70s or something to 80,” as did catcher Jonah Heim.
“A lot a strikeouts that I feel like he just overpowered a lot of hitters, which is who he is. He’s got that electric fastball,” Heim said.
“My mechanics were pretty good,” said deGrom, a meticulous worker who was feeling good after a side session the day before the game. “I’m constantly trying to perfect it and get in the best positions that I can get based on performance and health.”
Texas entered the night last in the majors with 91 runs scored, and only 12 combined the previous six games. DeGrom had gotten only nine runs of support in his first five starts.
The Rangers snapped a three-game losing streak while setting season highs for runs, hits (18) and walks (nine). They had three bases-clearing doubles in the same game for the first time in team history – Adolis García and Wyatt Langford each had one during a four-batter stretch in that big sixth, and Kyle Higashioka added his three-run double in the eighth.
Their offensive outburst came after the full squad was required to be on the field for batting practice before the game.
“Good to see you guys break out and have a good game. … Some success, it’s contagious,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “You’re hoping this is something these guys can build on, build some confidence.”
For deGrom, he improved to 3-1 with a 2.55 ERA in his 15 starts for the Rangers since signing a $185 million, five-year contract in December 2022. He is 85-58 in 224 career starts, the first 209 with the New York Mets from 2014-2022.
“He was really good tonight. You know, I said when season started, it’s just going to get better with him as he builds up his strength and stamina,” Bochy said. “Really good command tonight, really good stuff. And it’s just getting better with him.”
BALTIMORE — The New York Yankees became the first team in major league history to open a game with three consecutive home runs more than once in a season when Trent Grisham, Aaron Judge and Ben Rice went deep off Baltimore‘s Kyle Gibson in the first inning Tuesday night.
New York started the bottom of the first of its March 29 game against Milwaukee with three homers in a row. In that game, Paul Goldschmidt, Cody Bellinger and Judge needed only three pitches to hit three homers.
The Yankees added a fourth home run later in the first inning of both that game and Tuesday’s game, making them the first team to belt four in the first inning twice in a season.
On Tuesday night, the Yankees hit three of the game’s first five offerings out to right field.
“Grish got it going for us and set the tone for us early on,” Judge said after the 15-3 win. “When he goes up there and … sends one to Eutaw Street, it’s pretty impressive and gets you going.”
It was an ugly return to the majors for the 37-year-old Gibson, who made 30 starts for the St. Louis Cardinals last season before Baltimore signed him to a $5.25 million, one-year contract in late March. He’d been working in the minors since then before being called up before Tuesday’s game. He was finally pulled with two outs in the fourth after allowing nine runs and 11 hits.
“He gave up four homers in the first inning. That’s kind of a telling sign,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said. “At that point I’m just trying to figure out how we’re going to get through the game.”
After Rice’s home run made it 3-0, Gibson retired Goldschmidt on a grounder before Bellinger also homered. Anthony Volpe‘s RBI double made it 5-0 before the first inning was over.
Rice homered again in the second to make it 6-0. Austin Wells hit New York’s final home run — all six came with nobody on — with two outs in the ninth.
“It just shows that we’ve got a lot of depth in the lineup,” Rice said.
Not all the news was great for the Yankees, however. Jazz Chisholm Jr. left the game with right flank discomfort in the first inning.
Chisholm, who is hitting .181 with seven home runs this season, appeared to have hurt himself while he was batting. After being checked on, he stayed at the plate and hit a double, advancing to third on an error by right fielder Ramon Laureano.
Chisholm said he wasn’t worried about needing to go on the injured list.
“I’m really not as concerned as everybody else,” Chisholm said. “I tore my oblique before. I know it’s not torn or anything.”
The Associated Press and ESPN Research contributed to this report.
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