NASCAR's first ever Street Course race deemed a success despite odd circumstances

Racecar drivers from different disciplines of racing have dipped their toes into NASCAR racing throughout the years. Dario Franchitti from IndyCar; Kimi Räikkönen from Formula 1; Andy Lally from IMSA; and many others just to name a few. But a rare handful have ever strapped into a NASCAR Stock Car for the first time, and made the trip to victory lane, with Johnny Rutherford back in 1963 being the last… until Sunday afternoon.

If you’ve never heard the name Shane van Gisbergen, welcome to the club. van Gisbergen, a native from New Zealand who is a three time Australian Supercar Championship champion with nearly 80 wins, broke a 60 year record Sunday afternoon at NASCAR’s first ever Street Course race in Downtown Chicago, as he and his No. 91 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet took the checkered flag in the first position.

“Anything is possible,” stated van Gisbergen during the post race interview with NBC Sports. “The fans in Australia and New Zealand, the response this week and the coverage has been — I can’t explain it. Like the response and the support I’ve got from everyone and even over here how welcoming everyone is, I can’t believe it. Dream come true.”

van Gisbergen’s first win came at the Chicago Street Course, in the inaugural running of the Grant Park 220. The Chicago Street Course idea dated back as far as 2020, with hopes to show off NASCAR’s new NextGen car by racing on city streets, which has never happened in NASCAR’s 75 year history. Though things certainly were dampened due to tremental downpour of rain that hit the Downtown Chicago area Sunday.

“I think certainly a remarkable weekend, a historic weekend for us,” stated NASCAR’s Ben Kennedy. "We talked about this a lot, first in 75 years to celebrate a special year for us, obviously cap that with a special moment.”

The Grant Park 220 was scheduled to be 100 laps, but due to flooding in the city of Chicago that caused nearly an hour delay before the race started, as well as the late start time and the sunsetting around 8:30 p.m., NASCAR decided to shorten the race to 75 laps instead of the scheduled 100, to get the event in before the lack of darkness surrounded the track. Due to the track being temporary, there were no lighting systems to brighten the track to get the whole 100 laps in.

Shifting gears, the NASCAR Xfinity Series kicked off the weekends activities by running The Loop 121 Saturday afternoon, running a 55 lap event. However, thunderstorms around the area forced NASCAR’s hand into something they did not want to do. Due to NASCAR’s lightning policy along with the City of Chicago, the race had to be stopped on lap 26 after a lightning strike was within eight miles of the park. The race was red flagged for a while, before being pushed to run the rest of the event at 10 a.m. on Sunday morning… or at least that was the plan.

NASCAR did something they haven’t done in a long time, and that’s calling a race official before the race made it to the halfway point (this case, lap 28), making Cole Custer in the No. 00 Ford Mustang, winning the inaugural Xfinity Series race at Chicago. The reason why was due to more thunderstorms/lightning near the racetrack, and no visible sign of the weather getting better before the NASCAR Cup Series race later that afternoon.

NASCAR released a statement on the situation Sunday and stated, “With standing water and flooding a significant issue at the race track and throughout the city, there was no option to return to racing prior to shifting to NASCAR Cup Series race operations. Throughout the entire planning process for the Chicago Street Race, our relationship with the City of Chicago has been strong and among the most valuable assets in reaching this historic weekend. In the spirit of that partnership, returning on Monday for the completion of a NASCAR Xfinity Series event two laps short of halfway was an option we chose not to employ. Based on several unprecedented circumstances, NASCAR has made the decision to declare Cole Custer the winner of the race.”

So despite the challenges that NASCAR had no control over, the big question still remains. Will NASCAR return to race on a street course, and will it be in Chicago in 2024? Kennedy gave the answer. “Obviously we’re going to have a very deep dive postmortem after this event. A lot of surveys will go out collecting a lot of feedback. Of course there were a lot of things that went according to plan; there were some things that didn’t go according to plan obviously with the weather. We’re going to have a lot of takeaways from this weekend, which I think will be really good, but from what I’ve seen so far, certainly from the fans and from a lot of folks in the industry has been positive.”

The NASCAR Street Course race at Chicago is under a three year contract that will last till 2025, but only time will tell if public officials of Chicago and NASCAR will stick with the agreement.