SVG Staves Off Late-Race Challenge From Briscoe For Sonoma Cup Win

On Sunday at Sonoma Raceway, Shane van Gisbergen was victorious for the eighth time in his NASCAR Cup Series career on a road course, but boy, oh, boy, it was likely closer than he, or anyone else envisioned going into the race weekend.

Chase Briscoe, the driver of the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, saw his car come to life in the closing laps of the Toyota/Save Mart 350, and had it not been for a mistake with a few laps to go, he likely would have made things very, very interesting.

Still, he was able to apply enough pressure to van Gisbergen to keep the driver of the No. 97 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet on his toes in the closing laps of Sunday's race.

"[Briscoe] was coming. He was really, really good, and I ran out at the end," van Gisbergen said.

While Briscoe's car was the best it had been all day long, SVG, who led a race-high 74 laps in the 110-lap event, saw his car fading down the stretch. To make matters worse, lapped traffic continually slid off course, and kicked dirt onto the racing surface, which made things even sketchier for the New Zealander.

"Yeah, we had these shit boxes come out in front, and they were wobbling all over the track and putting dust, and I just kept struggling," van Gisbergen said. "Chase [Briscoe] was just really, really good. Yeah, a couple more laps, we would have had some problems."

However, there weren't any additional laps, and van Gisbergen was able to claim the win by more than three-tenths-of-a-second over Briscoe. The win marks the second of the season for van Gisbergen, and it's his eighth career Cup Series road course victory, which ties him for second-most all-time with Tony Stewart.

Van Gisbergen will head into the 2027 season just one road course win away from Jeff Gordon's all-time Cup Series record, which is nine. However, for the remainder of the 2026 season, van Gisbergen has his sights set on a potential Chase berth.

With the win on Sunday, van Gisbergen clawed from outside the Chase cutline to 36 points above it. He knows he still needs to improve on oval tracks, but Sunday's result was an important step in getting him into the postseason fight.

"It certainly helps, but I need to really step it up on the ovals," van Gisbergen said of his Chase aspirations. "We all do. Yeah, certainly helps us, but this is an oval championship, and I need to keep getting better at them."

Not many drivers in NASCAR, or in the world, can say they applied pressure to van Gisbergen in the closing laps of a road course event, but Briscoe can now chisel that onto his racing resume. However, being so close to the win, Briscoe couldn't help but wonder what could have been had he not made an error with a few laps remaining, which gave van Gisbergen a little extra breathing room.

"Yeah, just frustrated with myself," Briscoe explained. "I felt like I definitely had the better car. I didn't do as good of a job as he did driving. I just made a mistake with, like, three or four [laps] to go getting into [Turn] 1. I was having to push so hard, and that was where I would make up my ground. It was just such a razor's edge, and I about crashed."

Briscoe continued, "I was able to obviously run him back down at the end. If I don't make that mistake, I'm probably ahead of him, I feel like at the end. So, yeah, just bummed that at the end of the day it was my fault we didn't win, but amazing car."

Ty Gibbs had an incredible weekend, as he started from the pole position, swept the Stage wins in Sunday's race, and he capped the afternoon off with a third-place finish. The two Stage wins boosted Gibbs' final points haul on the day by an additional 20, and with the great run, he moved up from fifth to fourth in the championship standings.

Kyle Larson came home in fourth, and Christopher Bell, still nursing a fractured left wrist, ended the day with an impressive fifth-place finish.

Rookie contender Connor Zilisch, who has had a frustrating season, contended inside the top-five for the majority of the race, but faded on the final run of the race, and finished seventh. Still, it was the driver's first career top-10 finish in the NASCAR Cup Series ranks.

Tyler Reddick suffered power steering issues, which caused him to lose several laps on pit road during the race. As a result, he would finish last (36th), and would finally lose possession of the series points lead for the first time this season.

Denny Hamlin was poised to take a massive point lead over Reddick, as he entered the day just eight points behind, and was running seventh in the final Stage of the event. However, Hamlin was spun from the seventh position in an incident with Carson Hocevar and Brad Keselowski, and had to rally to finish 26th.

Still, it was just enough for Hamlin to take a one-point advantage over Reddick at the end of the day.

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