Column By: MARTY CZEKALA / RPW – NASHVILLE, TN – Many firsts are around the corner for “The Notorious SVG.”
In September, Trackhouse Racing signed Shane van Gisbergen to a developmental driver deal for 2024, featuring a schedule varying from the top three NASCAR series with some late model races.
Wednesday, we found out those plans.
SVG will race full-time in the Xfinity Series with Kaulig Racing while running seven Cup Series events next year. The deal comes as both are Chevrolet teams, and Kaulig partners with Trackhouse’s pit crew department.
Let’s begin with this. Kaulig Racing has won 23 Xfinity Series and 2 Cup Series races. It has a successful road course program thanks to AJ Allmendinger, with 10 combined wins coming on road courses.
Add on van Gisbergen and Allmendinger (who is from moving down from Cup to Xfinity), Kaulig Racing are the favorites to win on road courses with two of their three full-time drivers with road racing backgrounds.
Allmendinger has been in SVG’s footsteps, coming from road racing and trying to adapt to oval racing.
“I haven’t met him yet,” van Gisbergen said in a press conference Wednesday. “Hopefully, he’s open to giving me advice. He’s a superstar benchmark as a teammate. We’re in some good equipment. I’m excited to learn off him and push him to the front.”
While van Gisbergen has raced on road courses and a short track, his work is cut out when the calendar turns to February.
One type of track SVG has yet to race includes superspeedways. His next race will be at Daytona on Feb. 17, the first of six superspeedway races. In addition to the four Xfinity races planned, SVG will run two Cup races at Talladega. Van Gisbergen has been trying to study as much as he can with it.
“Normally, I watch them and think they’re cars going flat out,” van Gisbergen explained. “I’ve been watching Denny Hamlin’s onboard from last year when he had to come back from the field. Just trying to see how it all works. I got some SMT Data and saw more of the driver inputs. Watching it is like a high-speed chess match. I’ll get a little feel for the car at that speed (during practice).”
Kaulig Racing is a team that has had success on superspeedways in recent years, combining for seven wins. SVG has taken laps on iRacing and will get some time on the Chevrolet Performance simulator once it opens back up.
Expectations are low for van Ginsbergen, so there’s a manageable learning curve. It will be his first time racing Xfinity cars, as he only has two Cup starts and a Truck start on a short track.
“I’m trying not to have expectations,” said van Ginsbergen. “I want my preparation to be as good as possible. Results-wise, I have no idea what we’re going to achieve. You want to get some top tens, represent WeatherTech well, and have fun.”