SVG crashes, Truex Jr retires
Shane van Gisbergen’s chase for a NASCAR Xfinity Series hat-trick has got off to a tough start, while an Aussie crew chief is full of praise for the retiring Martin Truex Jr.
After stunning road course wins at Portland and Sonoma, van Gisbergen returns to an oval at Iowa in career-best form for Kaulig Racing.
However, his campaign in the Hyvee Perks 250 has started in unideal fashion in a tough practice disrupted by an incident.
Van Gisbergen got high and lost control on the exit of Turn 2, brushing the wall on corner exit before spinning across the track.
The front right suffered most of the damage on the #97 Chevrolet Camaro, which was limited to 22 laps.
After the incident, van Gisbergen emerged 27th fastest in the practice session with a top time of 23.670s.
Shane van Gisbergen loses control of his #97 Camaro. Image: NASCAR
He was 1.022s slower than leader Corey Heim in the Sam Hunt Racing Toyota, who edged out Jesse Love by 0.089s.
In the NASCAR Cup Series Noah Gragson led the way for Stewart-Haas Racing by the huge margin of 0.239s.
Ty Gibbs won the tighter battle for second best over Alex Bowman, Justin Haley and Chase Elliott.
But the biggest news surrounded Joe Gibbs Racing veteran Truex Jr, who announced the 2024 season will be his 19th and last.
The 43-year-old made his NASCAR Cup Series debut all the way back in 2004 and scored his first of 34 wins at Dover in 2007.
The big highlight of the 669-race career was the 2017 NASCAR Cup Series title where he won eight races including the Miami finale.
Since 2020, Australian James Small has been the crew chief of the #19 Toyota and whilst the former Supercars engineer was not surprised, was full of praise for the “incredible” Truex Jr.
“We’ve been expecting this for the last two or three years or whatever, and we get the opposite decision, so it’s not really any surprise,” Small told NASCAR.com.
“We would have loved for him to keep going another year. Ultimately, whatever makes him happy we support him.
“He is incredible. Obviously, he kind of flies under the radar, and that’s very much his personality.
“You look back on what he’s done since 2016, and the amount of races he’s won, he’s been one of the top two, top three drivers over that period.
“If a couple of things go a slightly different way or less errors, and he could be a four-time champion.
“He’s been a great friend and a great driver to work with and he’s very humble.”
Photo by John K Harrelson / NKP / LAT Images
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Podcast: SVG goes back to back
Shane van Gisbergen has gone back-to-back with a win in Sonoma, while his antipodean mates – Will Brown and Cam Waters – had mixed debuts in the NASCAR Cup Series… but both showed enough to stay on the radar or the US teams looking for the next Giz?
Plus, we’ve got all the latest news on Supercars, F1, IndyCar, and whatever else came to our minds at the time. We also look at the Darwin Supercars and the hypercars at Le Mans for the 24-hour race.
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