There’s no hiding the fact that it’s been a tough first third of the season for NASCAR Cup Series rookie Connor Zilisch, who, driving for Trackhouse Racing, sits 32nd in point standings with just four finishes inside the top-20.
Now, considering the major transition that comes when jumping from the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series to the NASCAR Cup Series, it’s basically a right of passage for drivers to struggle when making the jump – even for drivers who had dominant 10-win rookie seasons.
However, for Zilisch, over the last three to four weeks, there has been some positive progression as the Mooresville, North Carolina-native appears to be getting the hang of the seventh-generation NASCAR Cup Series vehicle, and with that progression comes results.
At Texas Motor Speedway, Zilisch put forward a career-best starting spot (12th) and a career-best finish on a non-drafting oval (16th). It took exactly one week for the career-best start to fall, as the 19-year-old qualified inside the top 10 at Watkins Glen, and would have finished top five, had it not been for an unscheduled pit stop late in the going.
With a little bit of momentum on his side, the highly esteemed driver came to NASCAR All-Star Weekend at Dover Motor Speedway, a track that he’s won at in both the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series and the ARCA Menards Series and had a performance worthy of being called an “All-Star”.
After a small hiccup in qualifying for the All-Star Race, where Zilisch spun out coming to pit road, the remainder of the weekend went smoothly. Of course, as a rookie, the Trackhouse Racing driver had to lock himself into the final 200-lap segment, courtesy of finishes in the first two 75-lap segments, which were filled with carnage.
Finishes of 11th and fifth in the first two segments left Zilisch to be the first of the Open entries to lock into the final segment of the NASCAR All-Star Race and left the No. 88 Jockey Chevrolet Camaro starting fifth. That starting spot was not a fluke, either.
“It was a big rebound from qualifying yesterday. I knew it was a long race, and I knew we had to get inside the top-26 there to try and give ourselves a chance in the invert,” Zilisch said. “We drove up to 11th in the first segment and continued to move forward in the second segment. That’s when I really started to realize that we had a shot. It was cool to be on offense, have good restarts, and not feel like a fish out of water.”
Zilisch was a legitimate top-five driver, if not better, during the first run of the final segment, and at one point in time, was in a five-driver battle for the lead with Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, Tyler Reddick, and William Byron – some of the best drivers in the series – and ran as high as second.
Then came the equipment interference penalty. Zilisch, with clearly one of the best race cars in the field, was sent to the back of the lead-lap and left to scratch and claw his way through the pack for the final 125 laps of the event. The No. 88 made some quick work of those outside the top 10, but progress slowed (as expected) as he got close to the front of the pack.
Though, with a couple of restarts and some persistent driving, Zilisch was able to get around Austin Cindric to return to the top five late in the going, finishing fifth. It’s that type of performance, though, that Justin Marks and Trackhouse Racing knew Zilisch was capable of when signing him to drive in the NASCAR Cup Series.
At 19 years, 9 months, and 26 days old, Zilisch is the youngest top-five finisher in the history of the NASCAR All-Star Race, beating out three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano, who set the previous record of 19 months, 11 months, and 29 days back in 2010.
“We needed a day like this for our No. 88 Jockey 150th Anniversary Chevrolet team, where we had contending speed,” Zilisch said post-race. “It’s been a long year, and the moments of hope like this certainly feel good. I don’t really know what to point our speed to. We still had some balance issues, but just the potential was there. We had potential in our race car. Everyone at Trackhouse Racing has been working really hard to get that and make it to where, even on the bad days, we’re still running decent. I feel like we had that today. We had potential and, honestly, room to grow. Just really proud of everyone on this team.”
The NASCAR Cup Series rookie heads to the Coca-Cola 600, the midway point of the regular-season, with some momentum on his side, as he looks to turn his season around. Last year, in a part-time effort, Zilisch finished 23rd in the 600-mile event.
