As All Drives Miserably Fail, Dale Jr’s 18-YO Star Cracks SVG’s Code With His Own Playbook

The 2025 NASCAR season has looked just like another road-course masterclass for Shane van Gisbergen. The 36-year-old Kiwi opened the summer by splashing to a 16-second romp in the inaugural Viva Mexico 250, shaking off mid-race rain showers and a flu bug to claim the largest Cup Series winning margin in 16 years. A few weeks later, he jetted north and became only the 2nd driver ever to sweep both the Xfinity and Cup events on Chicago’s streets, all from the pole, celebrating with a burnout that soaked through Grant Park’s fountain mist. With Sonoma up next, could another sweep be possible? That’s the question most fans had. But when the race finally unfolded, there was a different winner entirely!

Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s star, Connor Zilisch, has followed Gisbergen’s footsteps and tactics through to the victory lane. After a ragged pair of openers at Daytona and Atlanta, the rookie steadied the ship with a comeback victory at COTA, wrestling the lead from William Byron despite two off-track excursions. Stats note that Zilisch now owns a 2.3 average finish on road courses, second only to Terry Labonte, and sits comfortably 3rd in points heading to Watkins Glen. But all his credit goes out to his unofficial mentor, flipping the script for his path to victory.

In a post-race interview after his victory at Sonoma’s Pit Boss/FoodMaxx 250 race, Zilisch candidly talked about his learning experience from Chicago, after chasing SVG home to a feisty runner-up finish. “I learned about Shane as a driver and how he races and I definitely used that to help me make moves today,” Zilisch answered. “Blocking his runs and what it may be, I learned what runs he takes when he’s pushing and how he saves his tires.”

At The Loop 110, with just two laps remaining, SVG made a bold move into Turn 1, running Zilisch wide and wrestling the lead in a textbook street race maneuver. Despite dealing with a malfunctioning cool suit and balky carburetor, the Kiwi’s grit paid off, earning his first Xfinity victory of 2025. A week later at Sonoma, roles flipped in a tense rematch. Racing door-to-door through tight esses, Zilisch once again tested SVG’s pace. On Lap 2, coming out of Turn 11, Zilisch kept it steady down the inside, with the cars door-to-door. In the run-up to the final corner, Zilisch’s inside line turned to the outside as he overtook SVG into Turn 1.

“The first five to seven laps of a run there, he would set the pace,” Zilisch continued. “When I got out front, I set the pace. Tires made a bigger difference than you’d expect with how new the asphalt is. We would run very easy for five to seven laps and that’s probably why it looked like the rest of the field was hanging with us.”

On the final lap of the race, SVG nudged Zilisch in Turn 7, but then chose clean racing over contact, respecting his rookie teammate’s position. “We were playing a little bit of cat and mouse with each other, but that last run was very tough. We were both pushing to the limit and it took a lot of focus to keep him behind me,” Zilisch said. The pair traded lines all the way through Turn 11, but Zilisch held firm and won by 0.438 seconds, claiming his third win of 2025.

But this march to the front started in the pits. “The second one I was leading and we kept the lead and I was able to keep the lead,” said Zilisch, talking about his pit crew’s remarkable work on the field. “But the first pit stop, my pit crew did an awesome job to get me to lead. That got us a little bit of space in stage two. He still got by me after that and I was able to get behind him and learn a little bit more. I was able to get back by him at the end of stage two once his tires fell off a little bit.”

The decisive moment came a few minutes later under the lap-48 caution: with SVG’s crew forced to tighten a slightly loose left-rear, the JRM pit gang banged out a sub-15-second service, sending Zilisch back out first and lining him up as the control car for the final restart on Lap 51.

Despite the victory, Zilisch also admitted that the Saturday Sonoma battle was more about finesse than raw speed, noting that the new milled asphalt required intense focus over the course. “We were struggling out there,” said Zilisch. “It didn’t have a lot of grip and at the end of that 30 lap run at the end of the race, we were hanging on to it. But it was a lot of fun.” But what stood out even more was Zilisch’s respect for SVG, looking forward to competing against him once again at the next Xfinity showdown. “Shane’s a great road racer and a great friend of mine too and someone who helps me a lot and helps all of our Trackhouse teammates, pushes us to be better,” Zilisch praised SVG. “I’m excited to race against him again at Watkins Glen and hopefully get to learn a little bit more.”

And SVG himself couldn’t have been more proud of his junior, despite losing in his own game.

SVG balances aggression and integrity in Sonoma battle

With fading tires and Zilisch compromised on fuel, SVG got to the nose of his #9 Camaro within the striking distance multiple times, especially into Turns 7 and 11, but chose not to make contact. “I couldn’t do it without wrecking him, so I just tried every trick I could,” he said. “I think it was the last lap into (Turn) 7, I got there but wheel-hopped, pushed him wide, and yeah… could have gone but just waited. I didn’t want to do it like that.”

SVG’s post-race reflection revealed an internal conflict, one between adapting to NASCAR’s culture and staying true to his own racing principles. “In this type of racing… like it ran through my head into (Turn) 11 on the last lap, you’re allowed to just run through people and bump them wide,” he admitted. “But I’m not going to do that. So I tried to do a crossover and just didn’t have the grip out there. I had a lot of fun, and hope he did too.”

But perhaps the most revealing moment came when SVG described a conversation with Kyle Busch after the Chicago race, where SVG had pulled off what he believed to be a clean, textbook pass on Zilisch. “It’s weird here in NASCAR… I had Kyle Busch have a go at me after the driver’s briefing last week about it. And it baffles me, you know?” he said. “He said I went into the corner with no intention of coming out two-wide. That just shows the mentality here of what they expect… I have to listen, he’s well-respected and I respect him.”