NASCAR NEWS
SHANE VAN GISBERGEN TAMES SONOMA COURSE FOR TRIUMPH
For the third time in five races, Shane van Gisbergen leveled the field at a NASCAR Cup Series road course, zigging and zagging to victory at Sonoma Raceway in Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 in Sonoma, Calif.
The Trackhouse Racing road ace outran Chase Briscoe in a four-lap sprint on their third late restart to top the No. 19 Toyota driver by 1.13 seconds for his second straight win.
It was his third victory of 2025, tying him with Denny Hamlin, Christopher Bell and Kyle Larson for the series lead.
He won for the fourth time in 34 career starts, the fewest to get to four since Parnelli Jones needed 31 in 1967.
Chase Elliott, Michael McDowell and Bell were top-five finishers in the six-caution event.
After van Gisbergen scored his third consecutive road course pole and fourth overall of his career, all on road courses, last week’s Chicago winner led the field to green on a track that had been slick all weekend due to a sealer placed on the 12-turn, 1.99-mile layout.
The Auckland, New Zealand, native led the first 22 laps of Stage 1 but decided to pit with a nearly seven-second lead over points leader William Byron. That turned the lead over to Ross Chastain, who led after the 25th lap and grabbed 10 bonus points.
van Gisbergen and Bubba Wallace trailed the No. 1 Chevrolet at the break, with Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Byron completing the top five.
With 10 circuits left in Stage 2, Trackhouse teammates Chastain and Daniel Suarez, the 2022 Sonoma winner, made hard contact after Suarez’s No. 99 blocked Chastain and was turned backwards on the track.
van Gisbergen’s run in the second stage resembled the first, though he did it with a much smaller advantage. He topped Briscoe by over three seconds as pitting began on Lap 52.
After bringing his No. 88 in for service, van Gisbergen passed Larson, who led his first lap since Charlotte on Memorial Day weekend, for the stage win. Kyle Busch, Wallace and Stenhouse followed behind the pair.
Two incidents on Lap 62 brought out the first caution for cause as Chris Buescher forced Ryan Blaney off into a grassy patch and Wallace and Hamlin spun near each other.
INDYCAR NEWS
ALEX PALOU NOTCHES 7TH WIN OF SEASON IN SECOND HALF OF IOWA DH
IndyCar Series leader Alex Palou won for the seventh time in the first 12 races of the season, continuing his dominance Sunday at the Farm to Finish 275 in Newton, Iowa.
Palou, who finished fifth on Saturday in the first of two weekend races at Iowa Speedway, also kept himself within range of the all-time record for series victories in a single season. The record is 10 shared by A.J. Foyt (1964) and Al Unser (1970).
Al Unser Jr. also won seven of the first 12 races in 1994 and finished with eight victories that year.
“Speechless, honestly speechless,” Palou said in victory lane. “It’s been an unbelievable day, an unbelievable weekend. More than anything, what an incredible year for us.
“I really cannot believe it, honestly.”
It took a favorable break for Palou to win on Sunday, when he led 194 of the 275 laps — second among the two weekend races to Josef Newgarden’s 232 laps led in Saturday’s race won by Pato O’Ward.
Palou was in third place behind Newgarden and David Malukas, who both came in for fuel under the green flag in the final round of pit stops. Palou, however, stayed out on the track. He was able to come in for service under yellow when Colton Herta made contact with the wall on the backstretch, bringing out the caution flag.
Palou raced the remaining 11 laps to the checked flag. The Indianapolis 500 champion has now completed the INDYCAR cycle, winning races on street circuits, road courses, superspeedways and short ovals such as Iowa Speedway.
Scott Dixon was second, followed by Marcus Armstrong, Malukas and O’Ward. Newgarden faded to 10th place.
Palou is seeking his third straight series title and fourth in five years. He leads the season points standings by 129 over O’Ward.
Driver Nolan Siegel, who qualified fifth for Sunday’s race, was not medically cleared because of a mild concussion sustained in a crash on lap 248 of Saturday’s race.
The Arrow McLaren race team decided not to run the No. 6 Chevrolet on Sunday and said in a statement that Siegel, 20, will continue to be evaluated before the race next weekend in Toronto.
Siegel finished 24th in the first race of the Iowa doubleheader.
