At this point, if you name a road course, the one name that comes to mind is Shane van Gisbergen’s. By winning on Sunday by a mammoth 15-second gap, SVG is the new road course king in town. But his story doesn’t just end here at all.

Last race, at Kansas, he scored his first top-10 Cup finish on an oval, his best till now. Every race is showing his steady progress, especially when it comes to speedways. “It’s been a huge gain,” he admitted last month, and the entire garage is noticing this. His team owner, Justin Marks, has been all praise for him since the beginning, extending his contract with Trackhouse now. And as the road courses of the season are over, with just the oval journey ahead, SVG lays down his honest thoughts on his speedway progress so far.

Shane van Gisbergen evaluates his oval journey

In the Charlotte post-race presser, a reporter told SVG that when asked about his benchmark performances at the recent tracks, his team owner, Justin Marks, had said it was no longer a ‘benchmark’ situation. As long as SVG continues to immerse himself in film study and working with Stephen, his crew chief, he would be “very dangerous.”

Responding to the reporter about the process from here on and into the off-season, SVG said, “I think it’s still just time, I feel like every race weekend I’m learning something, even on a road course. These next three weeks are such a contrast of track. Like all 3 tracks are very different from each other.”

He’s right about the track differences. Las Vegas is a fast intermediate oval, and Talladega is a high-speed superspeedway that demands an expert level of drafting. Martinsville, on the other hand, is a tight short track that needs precision braking and patience, the track where his average finish of 23 is the best among the three.

“So that’s the hard part where you got to transition from the mile and a half to the short track or superspeedway. It’s going to be a pretty crazy finish to the end of the year,” he added.

Apart from the differences, the transitions are another headache. Even if he handles Vegas, the intermediate track that’s been the toughest for him statistically, the transition to the other two tracks needs a completely different approach, which will again test his progress aside from his road course legacy that he continues to build.

Then the self-introspection finally came out, “I need to be better at all disciplines of what NASCAR Cup racing is. Help us do better in the Playoffs next year. I really think we are getting better, that we need to execute and we didn’t in the Playoffs. My learning curve is pretty steep, and I feel like, as a driver, I’m getting more comfortable in understanding the car dynamics and setup every week. Feel like I’m always learning, as long as that doesn’t stop, I’ll keep getting better.”

One thing’s clear. SVG’s won half the battle by being so precisely aware of where he is and where he needs to be. He knows he has to put in double the work, double the effort, if not triple, than what his peers in the garage need to. And the fact that he’s optimistic about it certainly helps, as he acknowledges his racing knowledge growing deeper each day.

Owner Justin Marks also couldn’t help but paint a positive future for the Kiwi and a “dangerous” one for his peers in the coming times, “That’s why we signed him to a multi-year deal like we did, because we know that they will come. The fact that he’s so quickly already starting to find his way into the top 10 on the ovals, I think that there’s a very, very high ceiling there that can make him remarkably dangerous.”

With every lap, Shane van Gisbergen is proving that his NASCAR journey is more than just a crossover story. It’s a transformation in motion. The learning curve may be “pretty steep”, but his determination and adaptability are closing that gap faster than anyone expected.

As the season comes to a close, one thing’s clear: SVG isn’t here for his road course holidays; he’s building the very foundation needed to be a true all-rounder in NASCAR, one oval at a time.

But apart from him, the rest of the attention was on his Trackhouse teammate, Ross Chastain, who faced elimination after his last-lap tangle with Denny Hamlin. Marks, however, feels the issue went beyond that.

Marks feels Hamlin was innocent

Ross Chastain’s playoff dreams ended sadly at Charlotte, where, apart from other reasons, Denny Hamlin’s last-lap clash was the final nail in the coffin. His chess battle with Joey Logano finally ended with the latter sealing the final playoff spot.

But despite this, his team owner, Justin Marks, came to Hamlin’s defense amid the controversy, saying, “I think ultimately, you know, everybody’s out here to try to get the best finish and the best result for their team, and I don’t think anybody really owes it to anybody else to try to help anybody else.” Marks appreciated Hamlin’s approach, adding, “Denny’s doing what he’s got to do for the 11 team and try to get the best finish that he can.”

At the same time, Marks also felt that Chastain’s situation was pretty much caused by himself. “We shouldn’t have been in the position that we were in, having to fight for one point on the last lap, and having to throw Hail Marys,” he admitted.

In fact, Chastain himself took the entire blame, saying as he held back his emotions, “I single-handedly took a car out of the Round of 8 and a chance to go to the round of four…In two months, we’ve elevated ourselves from, I say, an 18th-place car to an eighth-place car. Today, we were good enough to run top five, and I took us out of that. It’s all on me.”

In the end, Marks’ words summed up the ruthless nature of the NASCAR playoffs, where every point, pit call, and even a single lap can shape a season’s destiny. And for Chastain, the heartbreak at the Roval was a painful reminder that in NASCAR, there are no favors, just fierce competition and some tough lessons.