Trackhouse’s Ross Chastain says this weekend’s NASCAR Cup race on the Chicago Road Course offers him “one other crack” at racing road-course star colleague Shane van Gisbergen.
Van Gisbergen gained final yr’s rain-impacted inaugural occasion on the streets of Chicago after an epic cost to the entrance within the last stint, setting quickest lap by 0.85s in Trackhouse’s Undertaking 91 entry to win by 1.25s over Justin Haley in additional time.
Now a full-timer within the second-tier Xfinity Collection, Trackhouse-contracted van Gisbergen can be contesting a partial Cup Collection program with Kaulig Racing and can pilot its No. 16 entry as NASCAR returns to Chicago this weekend.
Chastain – who has but to win a Cup race this season however has 4 profession victories to his title – completed solely twenty second 12 months in the past and has frolicked with SVG studying the best way to enhance his approach on NASCAR’s solely avenue circuit.
“He’s simply such a fantastic man and he’s bought little tidbits right here and there,” mentioned Chastain. “He’s an animal with regards to highway programs and we’ve seen that together with his two Xfinity wins already this season. He’s that good.
“It’s deliberately putting the automotive the place he wished to put it, and I used to be making an attempt to put it form of between the partitions and he was putting it on the wall, maximizing left and proper.
“It is easy to say it, however actually onerous to do it.”
Ross Chastain, Trackhouse Racing, Busch Nation Chevrolet Camaro
Picture by: Nigel Kinrade / NKP / Motorsport Photographs
Chastain has realized that van Gisbergen’s method to maximizing his time within the Chevrolet simulator was a key a part of his success, and confirms he’s put extra effort into that facet forward of this yr’s occasion.
“Nicely, he’s a machine with regards to preparation,” Chastain added. “I might say he’s form of main the cost for us within the simulator and getting it how he thinks it will likely be.
“However the streets up there could have modified and we’re all trustworthy with one another that the simulator is a device. Not less than I’ll have that to go off of, although.
“Final yr, I’ll be trustworthy, that I didn’t put sufficient inventory in his simulator prep however this yr I undoubtedly have.”
Ross Chastain, Trackhouse Racing, AdventHealth Chevrolet Camaro
Picture by: Lesley Ann Miller / Motorsport Photographs
When requested what he was most trying ahead to at Chicago, Chastain replied: “Getting one other crack at it, as SVG would say!
“Positively not the outcome I wished final yr. Didn’t really feel snug, didn’t make a whole lot of velocity, couldn’t move and actually struggled. It was a concrete canyon feeling and the partitions had been actually near the left and proper of the racing line.
“Trying ahead to getting one other shot and seeing if I can do higher.”
