Ross Chastain led Trackhouse Racing with a 24th-place finish in the Coke Zero Sugar 400 NASCAR Cup Series race at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway on Saturday evening. Teammates Connor Zilisch placed 25th, and Shane van Gisbergen finished 28th.
With a No. 60 Ryan Preece victory, van Gisbergen and the No. 97 team narrowly missed The Chase by 16 points.
“It’s pretty fresh now, but congratulations to the No. 60 (Ryan Preece),” commented SVG. “One night doesn’t sum up the year for this No. 97 Red Bull Chevrolet team. We just weren’t good enough tonight, but it’s been cool to be this close.
“Bit of the regular season has been good, but as a team, obviously we’ve struggled. But I’m proud that I’ve been able to match my teammates on the ovals. I think I’ve stepped it up this year. Obviously, you want to be in the Chase, but we were just short.”
Van Gisbergen started sixth for the 400-mile night race. He ran in the top 10 the entire first half. The stage ran caution free and on the final lap, van Gisbergen was able to steal the stage win when a multi-car incident happened in front of him. This was his sixth career stage win and first on an oval.
The No. 97 came to pit road to service the Red Bull Chevrolet and restarted the second stage on the front row. It was an uneventful segment as the No. 97 team was on a fuel saving strategy. Van Gisbergen narrowly missed out on stage points and finished 13th. Fuel strategy played a huge factor for him in the final stage.
The 65-lap stage ran caution free until the final 10 laps. The No. 97 team had to pit for fuel before lining up for the overtime restart. Van Gisbergen lined up 26th and battled his way forward before a multi-car wreck on the final lap forced the race to finish under yellow. Van Gisbergen was credited with a 28th-place finish after receiving slight damage to his Red Bull Chevrolet.
The NASCAR Cup Series will return to action Sunday, September 6 at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway.
Comments