NASCAR Live Race Updates: Grant Park 165 at the Chicago Street Course

To be fair, Chase Elliott, and William Byron were already set to start from the rear after they suffered suspension damage to their cars during Saturday's practice session, which prevented them from competing in qualifying later in the afternoon.

Alex Bowman qualified 11th, and Kyle Larson was 14th in qualifying, but both cars sustained damage during the qualifying session, and as a result, Bowman and Larson will join their teammates at the rear of the field prior to the green flag of Sunday's race.

Grant Park 165 Pre-Race Info

The Grant Park 165 will be televised on TNT, the second of five NASCAR Cup Series races to be covered by the cable television channel this season. The TNT Sports race broadcast will begin at 7:00 PM ET, and the five-race TNT schedule can also be streamed on the Max streaming service.

The Motor Racing Network (MRN) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will provide the radio broadcast of Sunday's race. For subscribers of the Max streaming service, NASCAR Driver Cam, which streams live in-car camera footage from every car in the field, will be available for today's race.

The overall race purse, which teams will fight for their portion of in Sunday's race, is a total of $11,704,450.

The race distance is 75 laps around the 2.2-mile, 12-turn street course, which equates to a 165-mile race distance.

The Grant Park 165 will be broken up into three Stages. Stage 1 will end at the conclusion of Lap 20. Stage 2 will end at the conclusion of Lap 45. And the race is scheduled to finish at the end of Lap 75, barring an Overtime finish.

The winner of Stages 1 and 2 will be awarded one Playoff Point, and the overall race winner will be awarded five Playoff Points. The Playoff Points will be added to the reseeded point totals if the drivers make it into the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, and will be carried through each round of the Playoffs.

Alex Bowman is the defending winner of this event, and polesitter Shane van Gisbergen won the inaugural Chicago Street Race in 2023.

Katherine Legge Locks Into Chicago Street Race with Resilient Qualifying Run

It was a pressure-packed Saturday afternoon for the five "open" teams on the entry list for Sunday's Grant Park 165 at the Chicago Street Course as there was only enough room in the starting grid for four of them.

With one car going home this weekend, marking the first non-Daytona 500 DNQ in the NASCAR Cup Series in seven years, many expected the final spot to come down to Josh Bilicki in the No. 66 Garage 66 Ford and Katherine Legge in the No. 78 Live Fast Motorsports Chevrolet.

Then, Legge had a hard crash in Saturday's practice session, and it appeared her hopes of qualifying into the field were over.

However, Corey Heim, a 16-time NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race winner, found trouble on his qualifying run in the No. 67 23XI Racing "Open" entry Toyota, which bent the rear toe link on his race car. The damage hampered Heim's speed, and gave Legge a fighting chance to lock into the field on speed.

Despite a sketchy qualifying run of her own, which saw her pop the wall a lap prior to her fastest lap of the session, Legge was able to muster a lap time two-tenths of a second faster than Heim, which sent the 23-year-old hotshoe packing. With the drama of qualifying behind her, Legge feels a lot better about her prospects in Sunday's race.

“I actually feel pretty good about it now, having done that," Legge explained. "It would have been a lot faster had I not of kept nicking the walls, I gave my crew a lot of work to do, but I just had to keep pushing and put it in the show, which we did, so I’m proud of them and I’m very much looking forward to tomorrow and a little bit less stress.”

Shane van Gisbergen Eyes Second Win of Cup Season With Pole at Chicago

Shane van Gisbergen smashed the field to capture the pole for Sunday's Grant Park 165 at the Chicago Street Course as he secured the top starting spot in the race by nearly half a second over Michael McDowell.

SVG turned a fast lap of 89.656 seconds (88.338 mph) in Saturday's qualifying session, which topped McDowell by 0.468 seconds.

"That was epic," van Gisbergen said after collecting the pole for the Grant Park 165. "I think the guys did a great job; the WeatherTech Chevrolet is really good. I'm a lucky boy, as I've got some great cars today - an Xfinity pole and a Cup pole. It's pretty special. Looking forward to the race tomorrow, but what a tune-up. Practice wasn't that great, went out in qualifying, car felt really good, and laid down two good laps."

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Grant Park 165 Starting Lineup

Click here for the full official starting lineup for Sunday's NASCAR Cup Series Grant Park 165 at Chicago.

In-Season Tournament Matchups

16 drivers remain in the inaugural NASCAR In-Season Tournament as we enter the second of five rounds this weekend at the Chicago Street Course. The opening race of the tournament at EchoPark Speedway wreaked havoc on the top seeds, which has caused a shakeup in who is left to battle for the $1 million prize.

Here are the eight two-driver head-to-head matchup pairings set for Sunday's NASCAR Cup Series Grant Park 165 at the Chicago Street Course, including the starting position for those drivers.

• No. 32 seed Ty Dillon (starts 36th) vs No. 17 seed Brad Keselowski (15th)
• No. 8 seed Alex Bowman (11th) vs No. 9 seed Bubba Wallace (37th)
• No. 12 seed John Hunter Nemechek (25th) vs No. 5 seed Chase Elliott (39th)
• No. 20 seed Erik Jones (34th) vs No. 29 seed Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (32nd)
• No. 31 seed Noah Gragson (24th) vs No. 15 seed Ryan Preece (7th)
• No. 26 seed Carson Hocevar (3rd) vs No. 23 seed Tyler Reddick (4th)
• No. 22 seed AJ Allmendinger (16th) vs No. 6 seed Ty Gibbs (9th)
• No. 14 seed Zane Smith (26th) vs No. 3 seed Chris Buescher (8th)

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