Shane van Gisbergen will defend NASCAR win at Watkins Glen from the pole position

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Shane van Gisbergen celebrated his 37th birthday on Saturday by gifting himself the top starting spot at Watkins Glen International.

The Trackhouse Racing driver qualified first on the 2.45-mile road course, earning the fifth pole of his NASCAR Cup Series career in his 62nd start — the fastest to reach that mark in nearly 20 years ( Denny Hamlin needed 49 starts to capture his fifth pole in April 2007).

Seeking to defend a dominant win last August at Watkins Glen, van Gisbergen is expecting tire management will be a major factor in Sunday’s 100-lap race. During practice, lap times dropped by 4 to 5 seconds over the course of a run as drivers found extra speed in cool, damp conditions. After 42 Cup races in the summer at Watkins Glen, Sunday will mark the first held during the spring.

“I expected it to be faster, but the falloff was insane,” said van Gisbergen, who became the ninth Cup driver to qualify first on his birthday with his first pole since last July at Sonoma Raceway. “I didn’t expect it to be that extreme. It was kind of like Bristol when it’s cold, and the tires would fall apart. It was very interesting. It’ll be a good race to watch but probably a hard one to manage.”

The New Zealand native will be the favorite, having won five of the last six races on road or street courses in NASCAR’s premier series. Michael McDowell qualified a season-best second, nearly 0.3 seconds behind van Gisbergen’s No. 97 Chevrolet.

“I feel like SVG kicked my butt,” said McDowell, whose No. 71 Chevy has finished outside the top 20 in four consecutive races. “But I’m really proud of everybody at Spire Motorsports. It’s been a rough few weeks here. Tire falloff was incredible in practice, so we got a decent lap in there, but man, then you watch how fast SVG is.”

Austin Cindric qualified third, followed by Ross Chastain and Connor Zilisch, who are teammates of van Gisbergen at Trackhouse Racing. The team is off to a slow start with only a combined four top 10s this season.

“We’ve got some good cars here this weekend, and hopefully we can capitalize on that,” van Gisbergen said.

Coming off his second win of the season, Chase Elliott, who leads active drivers with seven road-course wins, qualified a career-worst 27th at Watkins Glen (site of his first Cup win in 2018).