Entry List : Watkins Glen International

• Thursday, August 7th, 2025
• NASCAR Wire Service - Holly Cain

Twists, Turns, and Trouble: The Glen Could Flip the Playoff Script

With only three regular season races remaining to decide which 16 drivers will compete in the 2025 Playoffs, the intensity is picking up and Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen (2 p.m. ET on USA Network, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) road course event will undoubtedly be full of the kind of action expected at this point in the season.

The question is whether a driver currently below the Playoff cut line lands the ultimate big moment and claims the win Sunday?

Some of the sport’s best road course competitors from Joe Gibbs Racing’s Ty Gibbs to Spire Motorsports’ Michael McDowell to Richard Childress Racing’s Kyle Busch and Kaulig Racing’s A.J. Allmendinger are all still outside the Playoff cutoff line and winless on the season. A victory this weekend for any of them would have huge Playoff implications – for themselves and for others.

Gibbs won the 2021 NASCAR Xfinity Series race at The Glen. Coming from a sports car background, McDowell is a highly touted road course ace with a win on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course in 2023. Busch has a NASCAR Cup (2013) and Xfinity Series win (2017) at the track and Allmendinger – a three-time NASCAR Cup Series-road course winner – scored his first career victory there in 2014.

Count the defending race winner, Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing’s Chris Buescher also among those road course stars needing a big showing at the historic 2.45-mile Watkins Glen International. Last year Buescher held off the sport’s reigning road course ace, Trackhouse Racing’s Shane van Gisbergen in extra laps to claim the win.

This season, van Gisbergen shows up in upstate New York with three road course victories and a Playoff berth already this season while Buescher is ranked a tenuous 16th place in the standings, only 23 points up on his RFK teammate Ryan Preece and the first to potentially drop out of Playoff points should a new winner claim Sunday’s trophy at The Glen.

Eight active drivers have wins at Watkins Glen. And in addition to Buescher, Busch and Allmendinger, include last week’s winner William Byron (2023), his Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson (2021-22) and Chase Elliott (2019-2020), Denny Hamlin (2016) and Joey Logano (2015).

Byron’s win last weekend at Iowa also keeps an intense battle atop the standings. The reigning back-to-back Daytona 500 winner holds a slim 18-point advantage over his teammate Elliott for the Regular Season Championship and the 15-point bonus. Their Hendrick teammate, Larson, is only 45 points back.

23XI Racing’s Tyler Reddick holds the highest points-position in the standings among those without a win – 122 points up on 17th place Preece. Hendrick Motorsports’ Alex Bowman is ranked 15th, 63 points above the cutoff line, followed by Buescher in that perilous 16th position.

It’s a unique situation for the three-car RFK operation with Buescher and Preece fighting at the cutoff line and team co-owner Brad Keselowski, whose season has been buoyed by three top-10s in the last three weeks, all essentially needing a win for Playoff security.

“To be honest with you, Chris and I race really well together, so I think we have enough respect for each other on the racetrack to do it the right way, and we’re gonna race hard,” said Preece, who drives the No. 60 RFK Ford Mustang. “I think between this week and next week, I think both of us – he sees Watkins Glen as a great opportunity to go win and get himself in and the way I need to race it is gonna change throughout that race.

“From there, that will lead into Richmond and if the points battle is really close going into Daytona, obviously, we’re gonna take care of each other when it comes to superspeedways and the last few laps you’ve just got to do the best you can to try and win that race. So, I’m not really entirely sure of how to approach it, other than the way we’ve been doing it all year, which is take care of each other and race each other with a lot of respect and don’t wreck each other.”

Also, on the grid this weekend are road racing standouts, 19-year-old Connor Zilisch in the No. 87 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet and Katherine Legge, who scored a career best 17th-place finish at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway two weeks ago, in the No. 78 Live Fast Motorsports Chevrolet. Zilisch is competing in all three races at The Glen.

• Watkins Glen International
• Go Bowling at The Glen
• Busch Pole Award Pole Winner: Ryan Blaney
• Age: 31
• Team : No 12 - Menards/Richmond Water Heaters Ford
• Owner: Roger Penske
• Crew Chief: Jonathan Hassler
• Ryan Blaney won the Pole Award for the Go Bowling at The Glen with a lap of 7196 seconds, 122568 mph
• This is his 12th pole in 366 NASCAR Cup Series races
• This is his second pole and 10th top-10 start in 2025
• This is his first pole in nine races at Watkins Glen International
• Shane Van Gisbergen (second) posted his sixth top-10 start of 2025 and his second in two races at Watkins Glen International
• Chase Briscoe (third) posted his first top-10 start at Watkins Glen International It is his 14th in 24 races this season
• Shane Van Gisbergen (second) was the fastest qualifying rookie

• Drivers Entered: 40
• Laps Scheduled: 90
• Margin of Victory: 11.116 Seconds
• Time of Race: 2 Hours 10 Minutes 39 Seconds
• Average Speed: 101.263
• Cautions: 3 for 8 laps
• Lead Changes: 8
• Green Flag Passes: 3,273 (39.9 passes per green flag lap)

• Watkins Glen International
• Go Bowling at The Glen
• Race Winner: Shane Van Gisbergen
• Age: 36
• Team : No 88 - WeatherTech Chevrolet
• Owner: Justin Marks
• Crew Chief: Stephen Doran
• Shane Van Gisbergen won the Go Bowling at The Glen, his fifth victory in 38 Cup Series races
• This is his fourth victory and fifth top-10 finish in 2025
• This is his first victory and second top-10 finish in two races at Watkins Glen International
• Christopher Bell (second) posted his fourth top-10 finish in five races at Watkins Glen International It is his 14th top-10 finish in 2025
• Chris Buescher (third) posted his fourth top-10 finish in ten races at Watkins Glen International
• Shane Van Gisbergen (first) was the highest finishing rookie
• William Byron leads the point standings by 42 points over Chase Elliott