NASCAR CUP SERIES
RICHMOND RACEWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER QUOTES
AUGUST 15, 2025
Shane van Gisbergen, driver of the No. 88 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet, met with the media in advance of the NASCAR Cup Series practice and qualifying session at Richmond Raceway.
Media Availability Quotes:
How would you compare your level of comfortability in the Cup car last year versus this year?
“Yeah, a lot higher. It’s been good; building up throughout the year and getting better and better. Certainly, we’d go like a month between races last year, so just really driving one car mainly as a focus, and same thing every week – same crew and same people – makes a huge difference, that’s for sure.”
Can you talk to me about what your preparation looks like kind of in the week leading up to this race? Are you on the simulator? Are you talking to the team? What does it look like for the week?
“Yeah, a lot of video study, mainly. I try and study as many drivers as I can. Yesterday, I had the race on; watched last year’s practice, qualifying and race, and then had SMT up at the same time. That’s probably what I get more out of. I find myself sort of doing less and less sim and more video stuff. I find that sort of helping me more these days.”
Do you have a message for your fans in Australia and New Zealand? Every press conference, they come out with a ton of comments. What does it mean to you for your long-time fans to still be following your career today?
“Yeah, it’s very humbling how many people have followed me over here and tune in every Monday morning and watch the races. It’ll be Sunday this weekend, so they’ll probably enjoy that a bit better. Yeah, it’s been really cool having the support. Even when it’s a bad weekend for me, I still get a lot of comments and support. So, yeah, it’s really nice.”
I just want to get your thoughts about what your mindset is coming into this race. You’re two more playoff points from taking over the top spot. How do you balance, I guess, trying to gain more points and trying to gain more information for the postseason and not trying to be caught up in a possible big wreck or big crash on Saturday night?
“Yeah, well, certainly on the ovals, it’s harder for us at the moment to get the playoff points, that’s for sure. But we’re definitely working at it and I feel like every week we’re making steps and getting better. The result at Iowa wasn’t great, but I was a lot more competitive and racing really well. Even after we had our spin, we still got into a good position before getting wrecked. So there’s lots of positives coming, and, yeah, I think we’re getting better. I feel like we are, so who knows? We can hopefully start getting further up, but, yeah, certainly not where we expected or probably where everyone thought we would be on the playoff point leaderboard, so nice way to surprise people, I guess.”
The last couple of months, you seem very happy, on the track and off the track. If you could just talk about, you know, kind of the general ‘it’s good to be you right now’ type of thing…
“Yeah, winning certainly helps, but I felt like I was really happy at the start of the year, but it’s hard to look happy, I guess, when you’re finishing 30th every week. But I felt like there was a lot of positives early in the year, and we’re just building and grinding. This series is a grind, especially when it’s not going well. You know, every week you’re working hard with your guys and girls to get better. So, yeah, I felt like I was still pretty happy in March, April, May before, but yeah, certainly I feel like everyone’s pretty stoked and riding on a high — not just the 88 crew, but the whole team. It’s really cool at the shop at the moment with how stoked everyone is, and I feel like we got some good momentum as a team, and we’re getting better and better with every week. So it’s really cool to be a part of it.”
What was it like after last weekend with all three Trackhouse cars in the top-10?
“Yeah, normally Kap (Houston) rides around on his bike when we get a top-10 handing out ice cream to everyone, so I was wondering what we’re going to do when all three cars got in the top-10.
But yeah, it was pretty cool. You know, that’s a pretty special moment for the team. It’s not easy to run up front, so to have all three cars in the top-10 and genuinely be competitive, it was a really cool step.”
What was your process early on trying to figure out the ins and outs of oval racing? Did you pick out a car in practice and try to follow that car to pick up on how they were doing things, or how did you work that process?
“Yeah, good question. It’s just time for me, and even this week, like I’ve never been around this track in a Cup car. You see the fall-off in practice; it’s very tough to get up to speed straight away, so this week, I’ve kind of been studying Denny(Hamlin) and Ross (Chastain) the most. Ross’s car’s probably most similar to how mine’s going to be, so trying to just see what they were doing with gears. You can change gear a lot here, and it changes the car balance quite a lot. I just try and study those two guys.
But, you know, different tracks might be different people, who stands out, and just try and emulate what they’re doing, I guess. But for me, it’s just time. You know, I don’t know what it’s like when I’m out there, and no one knows what the patches are going to feel like at Turn One. Just try and do things by feel, I guess, too.”
What do you feel that you’ve perhaps grown on the most on short tracks? I know you mentioned Iowa. You didn’t get the results you want, but in terms of just this style from the start of the year as compared?
“Yeah, the short tracks, I feel sort of most competitive and feel most comfortable, I guess, to push, but the results haven’t shown that. I feel like my lap times and speed are good in sections of the race, I’ve just got to put it all together, and hopefully that starts to happen soon. But the short tracks, I feel like there’s a bit more driver manipulation you can do with the gear changes, the braking and how to phase sort of the tire wear. You can have a big influence on that, it seems.
So yeah, these kinds of tracks suit me. I did have a really good race at Martinville last year, but otherwise, the short tracks have been a disaster, so I’ve just got to put it together, I think.”
If you were to evaluate 2025, obviously all the road course wins, but what are you most proud of to this point in the year?
“Just how much we’ve enjoyed it. Every race weekend, even if it’s good or bad, I enjoy going into the shop on Monday and doing the meetings. It’s going to work every day, but it doesn’t really feel like a job. I’m loving every minute of it.”
With this track and all the different unknowns with the tires, the patches, all that stuff, does it give you time to dive into some of the other little details, like the number of people who get speeding penalties on pit road here?
“Yeah, it’s difficult here, especially with the two different speeds. You’re trying to be fast on the corners and maximize. I started the year bad with trying to push that. I think I had a stupid amount of penalties, and knock on wood, I haven’t had one for a while. I’ve been behaving and conservative on my speed. That’s another part of NASCAR that’s tough — every other series I’ve been in, you press a button and hold your foot flat and it does it itself. But it’s free lap time here, especially on a high fall-off track — you’re touring through the pits quite a lot under green, so it’s worth a lot of time and that’s where these guys are good, getting in and out of pit road without getting it wrong.”
Your Supercars career gets a lot of credit for your success on the road courses. Is there anything else that translates over from your experience in Supercars, whether it be just feel for the car, since they are similarly built? Have you talked to any other former Supercar drivers, like Scott McLaughlin… I know he’s in INDYCAR, but to get any additional help in terms of racing the ovals and that sort of thing?
“Marcus Ambrose is probably the guy lent on the most for just pure racing stuff out of Supercars land, I guess. Scotty was more, sort of, general living and how it is in America. But yeah, Marcus was a huge help, and if I do still need stuff this year, he’s been there for me, as well.”
What has been the biggest area of improvement for you and the crew this year?
“On ovals, it’s just general speed. It’s just taking time learning what I need from the car and understanding the car. When we go to a road course, I can tell exactly what area the car needs speed; which part to try and focus on. On an oval, I don’t fully know yet. I can describe what the car’s doing, but I don’t have that notebook of myself, whether it’s too stiff in springs, roll bars or cross weight. I don’t know what to ask for yet. Just trying to learn every week; trying to see what the setup is and what’s different to every other week. Just trying to help my crew point the car in the right direction, whereas on a road course this year, we’ve kind of trended one way on setup, and I feel like as a team and driver combination, it’s been really good and shown it’s made us better.”
How do you anticipate the racing to be with two races remaining before they set the playoff field? At Daytona, it’s kind of chaotic and hectic anyway, but even here on a short track, I mean, are you kind of prepared to know and be aware of this guy’s racing for his playoff hopes here?
“Yeah, for sure. I watched the race here last year and I can’t believe the lengths people go through to get in. It’s a desperate situation, and it means so much to get in the playoffs, so I’m certainly glad we’re not involved in it, and hopefully won’t be involved in it. But yeah, I think that’s an awesome part of this sport. It creates those storylines and that desperation to win when someone’s in that position. There’s a lot of people in the bubble and a lot of people needing a win, and hopefully that creates some good but safe racing for the next couple of weeks.”
You said you were looking at Denny’s (Hamlin) SMT data to learn here. Was that tough to follow? Because I’ve heard that his data is unlike most drivers, where he’s like stabbing at the throttle. It looks like a heart monitor when you’re looking at it. Was it tough to mimic that?
“Yeah, it’s just amazing when there’s different styles, right? His style’s very unique, the way he’s mainly using a different gear and stabbing at the throttle, and it’s just techniques I’ve never come across or needed to use before. But in NASCAR, there’s so many different ways to get the car around the track fast, and I’m trying to be as open-minded as possible in changing my style, especially for a track I’ve never been to before. I probably won’t try it today in practice, but if it gets stalled out in the race or in a moment where I’ve got time to try stuff, I’ll experiment a bit. All these top guys have such subtle little differences in the way they drive, and it’s really interesting trying to pick things up because I’m sort of like a clean sheet of paper with oval driving, so trying to find a style that works for me.”
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