SHANE van Gisbergen will make his superspeedway debut in a stock car despite initially failing to qualify for the ARCA Menards Series race at Daytona.
The three-time Bathurst 1000 winner and multiple Supercars Champion was among 50 cars vying for the 40-car grid, with the first 34 positions determined by qualifying time and the remaining six on provisionals determined by owners’ points from the previous season.
Van Gisbergen, driving a #28 Chevrolet for Pinnacle Motorsports, was competitive in practice on Thursday, setting the 13th-fastest time among the field.
However, ARCA’s qualifying procedure for Daytona sees groups of cars sent out one batch at a time to lay down qualifying times.
Per the official ARCA Series site, van Gisbergen didn’t get a proper launch off pit lane at the start of his group’s runs and lost the draft.
His time was still good enough for 35th place despite running on his own, but meant he missed the cut to qualify on speed by one position and less than half a second.
However, van Gisbergen was later elevated into the starting field when CCM Racing withdrew its #7 Toyota for Eric Caudell, which had qualified 17th-fastest.
Van Gisbergen is still scheduled to make his Xfinity Series debut with Kaulig Racing at Daytona, pending his approval to take part in a superspeedway race by NASCAR officials, who told media that missing the ARCA race would not have impacted his eligibility.
The ARCA race will get underway at 2:30pm AEDT, having been moved to Friday night local time to avoid the rain that is expected to impact the Saturday and Sunday schedule.
