Van Gisbergen shines at Indy
By Thomas Miles
Date posted: 27 July 2025
Shane van Gisbergen has continued his development by qualifying in the top 12 on an oval for the first time in the NASCAR Cup Series.
Van Gisbergen will start tomorrow morning’s Brickyard 400 from 11th on the grid after an impressive performance in NASCAR Cup Series qualifying.
As Chase Briscoe edged out Bubba Wallace by 0.013s with a 49.136s time, the Kiwi rookie put his Trackhouse Chevrolet on the sixth row just four tenths away.
Having joked about getting his oval best at Dover last weekend when qualifying was washed out, SVG has now done it for real.
His previous best qualifying results on an oval in the NASCAR Cup Series were a pair of 17ths achieved at Talladega during wildcard runs last year.
It is an all Toyota top five with Erik Jones, Tyler Reddick and Ty Gibbs beating leading Chevrolet Will Byron.
Over at Laguna Seca, Alex Palou again proved why he is the king of IndyCar at the moment.
Palou flew to pole, beating his nearest title rival Pato O’Ward by almost three tenths with a 1:8.3413s time.
“It felt amazing,” Palou said. “Honestly, the car has been amazing (all weekend). I’ve felt we had a ton of pace, like all year.
“Everybody at CGR has been doing a tremendous job making me look good on track.”
Victory will effectively seal a hat-trick of titles for Palou.
Colton Herta was best of the rest ahead of Josef Newgarden, while Australia’s Will Power showed strong enough speed to get into the top five.
Scott McLaughlin was down in 13th.
NASCAR starts at 3.30 AEST on Fox Sports, while IndyCar fires up at 5.00 AEST Monday morning on Stan Sport.
Image: Trackhouse
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