THREE-TIME Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin has given new NASCAR Cup Series winner Shane van Gisbergen the biggest compliment yet.
Hamlin beat Tyler Reddick and van Gisbergen to pole for the first Chicago Street Course race but NASCAR’s regulars proved no match for the Kiwi in race conditions.
In the wake of van Gisbergen’s debut win, Hamlin admitted he didn’t even know how to pronounce the Supercars champion’s surname.
“All weekend I thought it was Shane van Ginsberg, which is not it,” said the American.
“Shane van Ginsenberger, or something burger? Jinsenberger?
“I was walking out with him after qualifying and he was saying, ‘congrats, nice lap’ and what not.
“And I said to him, ‘big fan’. I’ve never talked to him before. I’ve probably seen, I don’t know, 50 total laps of Supercars racing. But most of the highlights are around this guy and how good he is.”
Even if he still struggles with the pronunciation, Hamlin sure knows who van Gisbergen is now.
The Joe Gibbs Racing veteran noted he’d be embarrassed had NASCAR’s stars been upstaged in such a manner on an oval or road course.
But once he realised that van Gisbergen is used to racing right-hand-drive cars and had to rapidly adjust – including shifting with the opposite hand to what he’s used to – Hamlin’s praise snowballed.
“That, to me, blows my mind. I guess I could do it, but I probably wouldn’t be very efficient shifting with the other hand,” he said.
“We knew he was really good, but this is blowing my mind as we talk about it.
“You know what? Crown him. Greatest f***ing athlete in the history of sports.
“I mean, he went from one side of the car to the other. I did it when I went to Japan for Toyota and I ran out in a GT3 car. It took me forever to get comfortable driving from the other side of the car.
“Holy cow. Everywhere you turn it’s pretty amazing, what he did.”
The big question now seems to be when, not if, van Gisbergen will make the full-time switch to NASCAR.
He is under contract until the end of 2024 with Triple Eight Race Engineering, but team principal Jamie Whincup today revealed that he will not stand in the way of an American opportunity for van Gisbergen sooner.
