BREAKING NEWS: Shane van Gisbergen to drive full time in the NASCAR Cup Series in 2025 in the No. 88

I I know it's not an on track result but it's a pretty big moment so I I think we've got to do it play the song I am absolutely shocked stunned almost speechless about today's news no not Shane Van gisbergen going full-time to cut but by the number he's going to be number 88 in the cup series yes Shane Van gisbergen it was just announced just made official he will be fulltime competing in the Nascar Cup Series in 2025 in a third track house car we have the number we have the crew chief we have some details we don't quite have the sponsorship lineup yet but we have quotes we have all of that to talk about the decision itself from track house so let's straight into it let's go to the press or uh the press release they just finished up the press conference actually but the press release says this what began as a one-off project 91 race in 2023 and continued as a successful exfinity series campaign in 2024 will turn into a full-time Nascar Cup series season in 2025 for New Zealander Shane Van gisbergen track house racing announced today that it has acquired a third Charter for the three-time supercars champion who will join Ros Chastain and Daniel Suarez in the team's 2025 Cup Series lineup and then team owner founder Justin Mark said this this is a big day in so many ways for track house racing Shane Chevrolet and race fans around the world this is an important step for our organization and it's a credit to the men and women at track house racing whose hard work and success the last few years had led us has led us to expanding to three Cup teams in 2025 it's also a big step up for Shane who took a chance on track house racing moved here from New Zealand and now joins the most competitive stock car racing series in the world everyone will get to watch one of the world's racing Superstars compete in the Nascar Cup Series next year then SVG said this this is what I have planned for and I am ready I know there is a tough learning curve ahead but the best way to learn is go out and do it I feel I have made progress running the Xfinity Series this year with col racing and I can't thank everyone there enough I look forward to the cup series those drivers and teams are the best in the world and it will be an honor to be a part of their series and then moving on to the number the number is 88 get yourself a good look at the number font couple of colors here we got blue and red then it goes on to say this vanis berens Chevrolet Will C carry the number number 88 in 2025 that car number has been driven to Victory Lane 76 times in NASCAR history by Legends including Dale Earnhart Jr Daryl Waltrip Dale Jarrett Donnie Allison Ricky red Rusty Wallace Buddy Baker and others then we got the crew chief as well Steven Duran 38 will serve as the number 88 crew chief in 2025 Duran in his first year as a NASCAR cup series crew chief working with driver Zane Smith on the number 7 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet the Butler Pennsylvania native began his Nascar career in 2006 at Petty Enterprises and worked as Kevin Harvick's lead engineer at Stuart house racing from 2014 to 2023 so yes as I said we got a good bit of detail from this now the way we talked about it yesterday track house just less than 24 hours ago maybe 24 hours almost exactly but anyways 24 hours ago let's just call it even 24 hours ago track house released a statement saying that them the team and zanen Smith had parted ways they signed about this time last year Shane Van gisbergen and track house signed about this time last year so that meant that Ros Chastain Daniel Suarez Zan Smith and Shane Van gburg and that's four guys were all under contract with track house racing track house has not been quiet on wanting to expand it has been well known that they wanted to expand operations expand their team so they could have more drivers more cars be more competitive and ultimately they they've only been able to expand to one car or they will only be able to expand to one car and when the opportunity presented itself it came down to Zane Smith versus Shane Van gisbergen Justin marks talked about it a little bit in his press conference didn't really want to into a ton of detail he went into some detail but not like you know every single second of it but ultimately said that it came down to he wanted to put Shane in the car and then also said it came down to the commercial opportunities when they were getting approached by partners and they had to get the deal done so the opportunity presented itself Shane Van gber and obviously has had success in NASCAR and while he is still learning the ovals he's still figuring it out he's so competitive on the road courses it's hard to overlook and he's a great look in terms of if you're a sponsor the opportunity the story that has the following that he has that you can really it it's huge it really is so just everything came together Shane Van giz berens had a pretty decent rookie season in the Infinity Series so everything came together everything made sense so Justin marks pulled the trigger on it they pulled the trigger over at track house on Shane Van and gisbergen full-time in 2025 now as for everything else as for this Charter itself track house has acquired a third Charter this was expected this was anticipated Justin marks was directly asked I think it was Bob pckers who said hey where'd you get the charter from and he said well what would you guess what's your guess and yeah so Bob guessed Stuart hos and yeah so Justin Mark didn't directly say yes we got it from Stuart hos but we can pick up it came from Stuart hos racing meaning Stuart hos racing their Charters have now been sold to track house front row and then of course Jean hos kept one for himself to keep the H the hos Factory team alive meaning there's one more for either RFK 2311 probably 2311 but RFK is now in that mix and that's a whole other story but uh yes so we've covered Shane Van gisbergen it's official he's in the Cup Series in 2025 we've covered the charter they've acquired a third Charter Justin marks even expressed confidence that while the charter negotiation deals aren't exactly in a great place right now he said they pulled the trigger on this now because he doesn't expect the Charter system to go away he's pretty confident still going to be a thing so when you have the opportunity when you have the resources in every single factor in every single facility why not pull the trigger on this thing why not do it and ultimately that is what it came down to next thing we got to talk about the number obviously Shane Van gisbergen this is going to be his let's see he debuted in the 91 car in the cup series then he ran the 41 truck in the truck series 97 in Infinity 16 in Cup this year so this will be his fifth different number in just three years of NASCAR obviously the number 88 with NASCAR fans is most known as of recently with Dale nhart Jr even though Alex Bowman was the last driver to drive that number The Last Driver to win in that number it is very well known for Dale nhart Jr who drove that race car number for the last eight nine years of his career at Hendrick Motorsports Justin Mark said he talked to Dale Jr talked to Kelly nhart Miller about the number called up Jeff Gordon even at Hendrick Motorsports and I will say so this morning it when it was reported that track house had a driver announcement and everyone knew it was going to be SVG dard Jr said something like he was excited for this he was looking forward to this announcement and I was like why does Dale Jr cares so much about Shane Van gisbergen and I was like that's so weird I was like I mean he loves to see the sport grow he loves a good story he loves a good race car driver but I was like what that's so random and I just kind of brushed it off didn't even think about it did not I did not think twice about it I just said okay cool Dale Jr's a fan neat and then the instant that 88 got announced I was like why 8 oh Dale nhart Jr drove the 80 it all makes sense now so yes Dale nhart Jr the most popular driver in NASCAR for what 14 straight years well his number is now being handed off to Shane Van gisbergen in terms of the number system in NASCAR numbers are not really assigned to teams the teams can pick what number they can run obviously it has to be a real number like you can't be number 12876 or anything but you obviously there are certain situations where if a number is available and you're team expanding and you pick up that number it's the the honor the unwritten rule to ask permission to ask to have the privilege to run that number so Justin Mark said we talked to him about it we wanted to add to the Legacy he also emphasized that with the one car the 99 car that when they opened up track house he called up Carl Edward said hey we got this number and we want to continue to build on its Legacy to continue to win races it same thing with the one car and now with this 88 car it's the same story as for the 97 uh I thought it was going to be the 97 that was Shane Van guren's number over in Australia but ultimately that's just not going to be it I don't know why I know Rous finway racing ran it back in the day maybe they want to keep that close to Heart they want that to be their number they want to bring that car back one day so maybe Rous didn't want them using it and track house respected that decision um but I don't know I really don't know but as for the 88 it's going to be a new number for Shane van gisbergen and then there's a little coincidence that Connor zillich also a track house racing driver he's going to be racing in the Infinity Series for Dale Jr actually next year in the 88 car so there's a little connection there and you can speculate all you want on what that means and then the next piece of business would be the crew chief Steven Duran as I said um he's been the crew chief for Zay Smith a rookie crew chief this year and he gets to get another the rookie next year Shane Van gisbergen I'm assuming he'll be classified as a rookie next year he's only run 10ish Races by the end of 2024 so I think he'll be a rookie in 2025 so it's going to be another rookie campaign for Stephen Duran to have another rookie driver but obviously it was a rough start to the year for zaye Smith but they've really picked it up as of recent they've run really well a couple of top 10 even a runnerup finish and they've actually got like an average finish I think it's f .8 over the summer so they've really picked it up so Steven Durant Shane Van gisbergen and the number 88 team at track house racing sponsors to be announced in the future paint schemes that's that's an end of 2024 calender wise beginning of 2025 thing but Shane Van gisbergen who only had what 15 to 18 race weekends a year in supercars well he's about to get the full thing he's going to be running 38 race weekends in 2025 so yes it's going to be a big year for Shane Van gisbergen next year obviously a lot of expectations a lot of looks on him how's he going to do and what else will he do will he run Xfinity he said that he's talked to collag he would love to run Xfinity with that team again he was thankful to colag for putting him in their cars for giving him the opportunity to run in the Infinity Series learn the ovals and then also to run in the cup series as well which he'll be doing for seven of the last 12 weekends in 2024 including tonight at Daytona but it's official Shane Van gizen will be a full-time Nascar Cup Series driver in 2025 the whole reason he came over to the United States of America he's now there and as for everything else that has not been announced now as I said it will be announced in the future let me know what your thoughts are on this move by track house signing Shane Van gisbergen to a full-time Cup Series contract in 2025 and I will talk to you guys in the next video tonight after Daytona the Cup Series race