To be eligible to compete in the NASCAR Xfinity Series opener at Daytona, Shane van Gisbergen must enter the ARCA Racing Series event earlier in the day.
Trackhouse Racing, who has loaned the three-time Supercars champion out to Kaulig Racing for the full Xfinity Series slate, also confirmed that SVG would enter the ARCA race at Daytona with Pinnacle Racing Group.
The team is arguably the most viable Chevrolet affiliate in that category and fielded cars for Luke Fenhaus last season. It is operated by Mark Webb, Jerry Webb and veteran racer/crew chief Shane Huffman.
This will be the first full-time NASCAR season for van Gisbergen, who in addition to his full Xfinity race, will also run select Cup Series events. He won in his Cup debut in July on the Streets of Chicago for Trackhouse’s Project 91 Chevrolet.
That van Gisbergen even has to enter the ARCA race was still a bit of an odd requirement for NASCAR. On one hand, this has long been the standard operating procedure for rookies who have yet to race on superspeedways even for the likes of Juan Pablo Montoya in 2006.
But back then, the ARCA race was the weekend prior to the Trucks, Xfinity and Cup races and now van Gisbergen would have to race back-to-back and there is the possibility that he could be eliminated in a first lap crash.
NASCAR would likely permit him to race the Xfinity race anyway under that circumstance so it’s still an odd requirement.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.