It felt less like a question and more like a scheduling formality.
Shane van Gisbergen completing the sweep at Sonoma had the same energy as sunrise. Everyone knew it was coming. The only mystery was whether anyone could make him sweat before it happened.
As it turned out, Chase Briscoe absolutely could.
Van Gisbergen survived a late charge Sunday to win the NASCAR Cup Series race at Sonoma Raceway, but if anyone expected the New Zealander to disappear over the horizon and casually collect another road course trophy, they got something considerably messier and a lot more entertaining.
The Trackhouse Racing driver used strategy as much as speed, flipping both stages while polesitter Ty Gibbs collected the stage wins. SVG finally grabbed control for good on Lap 88 and then spent the closing laps hanging on with Briscoe attached to his rear bumper.
When the checkered flag flew, van Gisbergen’s margin of victory was just .357 seconds. Last year he beat Briscoe here by 1.128 seconds.
That difference mattered.
“Yeah, what a day,” van Gisbergen said afterward. “We were really bad yesterday, and these guys did an amazing job turning this car into a winner. The 19 was coming. He was really, really good, and I ran out at the end.”
The opening stage was almost suspiciously civilized by Sonoma standards. After a brief first-lap fight, Gibbs took command from Carson Hocevar and looked in control early.
Meanwhile, van Gisbergen was doing van Gisbergen things.
Starting sixth, he was already fourth by Lap 8 and second by Lap 14.
Then came the move that changed the race.
Twenty-three cars, led by SVG, elected to flip the stage and pit before the finish. Gibbs stayed out and claimed Stage 1 ahead of Christopher Bell, but the cost came immediately when the restart order shuffled and handed van Gisbergen track position.
SVG led the field to green for Stage 2 on Lap 28 and proceeded to demonstrate why NASCAR keeps bringing him to places with right turns.
He led nearly every lap of the stage and built a lead of nearly ten seconds before repeating the strategy and pitting again on Lap 53. Gibbs inherited the lead and completed the stage sweep, but SVG emerged exactly where he wanted to be for the final act.
Van Gisbergen restarted first for the final stage on Lap 60 with Connor Zilisch lined up behind him in what briefly looked like the showdown everyone wanted.
It lasted about five minutes.
Austin Cindric got into Josh Berry deep in the field, spinning Berry and bringing out the first caution for cause of the afternoon.
When racing resumed on Lap 64, SVG launched.
Not that the rest of the field had agreed to stay orderly.
Denny Hamlin spun in Turn 7 after contact from Hocevar and suddenly looked in danger of another embarrassing early exit in NASCAR’s in-season challenge while Ty Dillon quietly ran inside the top 10. Within another lap Todd Gilliland, Chase Elliott and John Hunter Nemechek had all found trouble too.
Up front, Briscoe had found something.
He moved around Zilisch into second and unlike Stage 2, van Gisbergen couldn’t break free.
Lap after lap Briscoe stayed attached.
Birddogged him.
Forced mistakes.
Made SVG earn every inch.
Those final laps looked every bit as uncomfortable as they sounded on the radio.
“We had these boxes come out in front and they were wobbling all over the track and putting dust everywhere and I just kept struggling,” van Gisbergen said. “Chase was just really, really good. A couple more laps and we would have had some problems.”
Briscoe climbed out believing he let one get away.
“Not very many people get that close to him at the end of one of these road course races,” Briscoe said.
“I felt like I definitely had the better car. I didn’t do as good of a job as he did driving. I made a mistake with three or four to go getting into one. I was having to push so hard. If I don’t make that mistake, I’m probably ahead of him at the end.”
Then came the line that probably explains Sonoma better than any lap chart.
“Against that guy, you’ve got to be absolutely perfect.”
Ty Gibbs finished third after sweeping the stages, followed by Kyle Larson and an impressive fifth-place effort from Christopher Bell, who continues racing while managing a broken wrist.
Ryan Blaney was sixth while Zilisch collected his first Cup Series top-10 in seventh. Ryan Preece, Michael McDowell and Alex Bowman completed the top 10.
Further back, Tyler Reddick’s afternoon went from inconvenient to catastrophic. The points leader entered Sonoma atop the standings but suffered power steering issues in his Toyota, lost four laps and finished dead last.
That opened the door for Hamlin.
Remarkably, despite spinning and finishing 26th, Hamlin left Sonoma with the points lead and advanced in the in-season challenge after Ty Dillon’s late mechanical issues dropped him from what looked destined to become another bracket-busting upset.
For van Gisbergen, the win also served as something of a reset after a frustrating previous week in San Diego.
Asked whether he brought extra anger into Sonoma, SVG laughed.
“I was back to normal by the weekend, but yeah, I was certainly pissed at the start of the week,” he said. “This really makes up for it.”
Next up, NASCAR heads back to Illinois, trading Sonoma’s rolling vineyards for the resurrected 1.5-mile oval at Chicagoland Speedway, returning to the schedule for the first time since 2019.
And after another road course masterclass from SVG, everybody else gets to go back to racing somewhere he admits he still has homework to do.
“This is an oval championship,” van Gisbergen said. “I need to keep getting better at them.”
RACE RESULTS
Greg was a writer for DriveTribe supporting Amazon's The Grand Tour and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, and a Masters degree in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek and a regular contributor to Forbes.
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