Shane van Gisbergen has produced one of the great recovery drives of his NASCAR career, charging back from a 29-second deficit in the final stage to win Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen and take his seventh Cup Series victory in the United States.
The Aucklander, driving the No. 97 Trackhouse Chevrolet, ran down Ty Gibbs over the closing 18 laps at Watkins Glen International and crossed the line 7.288 seconds clear of Michael McDowell to defend the trophy he won at the same circuit last year. Gibbs faded to third, followed by Chase Briscoe and points leader Tyler Reddick.
It was van Gisbergen’s first Cup win of the 2026 season and stretched his remarkable run on twisting, technical circuits. Every one of his seven Cup victories has come on a road course or city street circuit, and he has now won six of the last seven such races in the series, a streak that stretches back to his maiden triumph in Mexico City in June 2025. He also holds the Cup Series record for most wins by a driver born outside the United States.
Sunday’s win never looked guaranteed. Van Gisbergen took the green from pole and led 74 of the 100 laps around the 2.45-mile circuit in upstate New York, but his Trackhouse crew gambled on a late pit stop with 24 laps to go, hoping fresher tyres would carry him through the field over a long final stint.
The strategy worked, but only just. When van Gisbergen rejoined the racetrack he was running 24th and nearly 30 seconds behind Gibbs. With no late caution to bunch the field, he had to do it the hard way.
“Unbelievable to win with 97,” van Gisbergen said after the race, as quoted by Motorsport.com. “This SuperFile Chevy was great. Thank you to Trackhouse.”
He picked off cars two and three at a time as the laps wound down, slicing more than a second a lap out of Gibbs through the back half of the stint. The pass for the lead came with seven laps remaining and from there the New Zealander stretched away to win as he pleased.
Van Gisbergen also paid tribute to the calibre of the field he had to work through, telling reporters at the finish that the result was anything but easy. “Everyone is really good. There was a lot of pressure there, and I think McDowell was good, Connor [Zilisch] was good. Tyler Reddick. There was a lot of good guys and a lot of pressure,” he said, in comments reported by Motorsport.com.
The win is van Gisbergen’s second in a row at Watkins Glen and confirms his status as the man to beat any time NASCAR turns away from the ovals. He has joined a tiny group of drivers who have repeated at the New York circuit and he is the first international driver to win the race in back-to-back years.
The 36-year-old, a three-time Supercars champion in Australia before crossing the Pacific, came to NASCAR full-time at the end of 2023. The pundits who wondered how a road racer would adjust to a category dominated by 1.5-mile ovals quickly had their answer. His debut at Chicago’s street circuit in July 2023, taken from pole, made him the first driver since 1963 to win his first Cup start. The road course wins have kept coming ever since.
For Trackhouse Racing it is a much-needed first win of the 2026 campaign and arrives at a useful moment. The Watkins Glen result vaults van Gisbergen into the conversation for a playoff spot, with automatic qualification on offer to race winners, and gives the team momentum heading into the Charlotte All-Star weekend.
Tyler Reddick will leave the Glen still atop the regular-season standings after his fifth, with McDowell’s runner-up finish lifting him into the playoff picture as well. Gibbs, who looked the likely winner with 10 laps remaining, will be left wondering how he let van Gisbergen come from so far back.
The result added another road course feather to van Gisbergen’s American cap. According to the NASCAR race recap, his record on road and street circuits since arriving full-time now reads better than any driver in modern Cup history. He will be a strong favourite at Sonoma next month and at the Chicago street race in early July, and the Indianapolis road course return later in the season looks similarly inviting territory.
What remains harder is the oval racing that still makes up the bulk of the schedule. Van Gisbergen has improved steadily on the big tracks across his second full season but a victory off the road course menu remains the obvious next step. With another road course win in the bank, he can afford to keep chipping away at that learning curve from a position of strength.
For now though, the man from Auckland’s North Shore can simply enjoy a Mother’s Day in the United States that ended with another trophy on the Trackhouse mantelpiece, another reminder of why the team signed him in the first place, and another night spent answering questions about how on earth he keeps doing this.
What do you make of van Gisbergen’s latest road course masterclass and how far do you think he can go in NASCAR this season? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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