Shane van Gisbergen amazingly erased a 28-second deficit in the final 24 laps after a pit stop, chasing down leader Ty Gibbs and roaring away to win the NASCAR Cup Series’ Go Bowling At The Glen on Sunday at Watkins Glen International in Watkins Glen, N.Y.
The New Zealand-born driver fell to 22nd after his last stop under green, but he set out to run down Gibbs and second-place teammate Connor Zilisch. He continued to chop off seconds each lap and passed Gibbs’ No. 54 Toyota with eight laps left.
The No. 97 Chevrolet driver beat Michael McDowell by a massive 7.288 seconds, leading four times for 74 laps.
van Gisbergen, who made up a 29.2-second gap after his final pit stop in 18 laps, notched his sixth victory in the past seven road races and secured his seventh career Cup win in just 62 starts.
Gibbs, Chase Briscoe and Tyler Reddick rounded out the top five.
In 2026’s second race on a road course, van Gisbergen started from the point after winning the pole Saturday on his 37th birthday and sailed away from McDowell’s Chevy by over two seconds after eight times around the layout.
As the only driver on pit road coming in after leading the first 18 laps, van Gisbergen managed to finish eighth and earn stage points. Trackhouse’s Ross Chastain was first in the segment win followed by Team Penske’s Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney, but Chase Elliott decided not to pit and stayed out for points and ended up 12th.
In the 30-lap Stage 2, two of the three Trackhouse drivers, van Gisbergen and Zilisch, checked out entirely, taking a healthy five-second lead over McDowell by Lap 38. Meanwhile, Chastain’s No. 1 fell back to 18th until flying debris — a black tent — landed on the track on Lap 40.
Spire Motorsports teammates McDowell and Daniel Suarez started 1-2 with seven laps left in the stage, but the two Chevy drivers faded with two laps to go. van Gisbergen beat Reddick by less than a second followed by Gibbs, Austin Dillon and Kyle Busch to end Stage 2.
Caution 3 flew on Lap 60 when Logano’s No. 22 Ford lost a left front tire. van Gisbergen and Reddick stayed out for track position, but the majority of the field pitted with the chance to make it to the end of fuel.
