Trackhouse first appeared as a race team in 2021 when they entered the NASCAR Cup Series as an unremarkable single-car team. However, when they bought Chip Ganassi Racing in its entirety, they shocked the NASCAR world and got everyone to pay attention to them, and not for the last time.
Since then, Trackhouse has branched out and now fields three full-time entries in the Cup Series, as well as signing the biggest rising star in the stock car world. They formed a MotoGP squad with support from Aprilia ahead of the 2024 season, and even took part in the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona this year with a GTD Pro entry, placing ninth in class.
This weekend, they hit another milestone as they became winners at the pinnacle of two-wheeled motorsport, winning the MotoGP Australian Grand Prix with Raul Fernandez. The team hadn’t even scored a podium before Sunday’s triumph.
With their impressive victory in MotoGP, we thought it would be a good time to look back at the times Trackhouse, who have become known as disruptors in NASCAR, took the racing world by surprise.
Project 91 and the triumphant arrival of road course king SVG
Watch: Shane van Gisbergen wins Chicago in his first NASCAR start
Project 91 was a fascinating idea that came from the mind of Trackhouse founder Justin Marks. He wanted to bring international racing stars to NASCAR in one-off entries in an effort to expose the sport to a larger audience, but also provide opportunities these drivers wouldn’t otherwise get.
The car has only entered a handful of races over the last few years, but it has featured 2007 Formula 1 World Champion Kimi Raikkonen, four-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves, and of course, three-time Supercars champion Shane van Gisbergen.
The car’s mere presence on the grid was impressive enough, bringing in some huge names and clashing racing worlds together. But SVG took whatever surprise people felt and turned it into utter shock. He won on debut at the Chicago Street Course in 2023, becoming the first driver in over 60 years to win a NASCAR Cup race in their very first try.
Since then, he has walked away from his career in Supercars to take on the stock car racing world fulltime. While he has rapidly progressed on ovals, van Gisbergen has also stunned on road courses in 2025. He has won the last five consecutive road/street courses on the schedule and become the winningest rookie in Cup Series history.
Ross Chastain’s viral wall-ride and nearly becoming Cup champions
Watch: See multiple angles of Chastain’s last-lap move to advance at Martinsville
When it comes to head-turning moments, the team’s flagship NASCAR star has had plenty of them … both good and bad. But nothing compares to the move he pulled at the end of the 2022 season. Chastain was a Ganassi driver with no wins when Trackhouse took over the team. He quickly changed that with a dramatic win at COTA (Trackhouse’s first in NASCAR), and the unpredictable driver went deep into the playoffs.
In just their second year as a race team, they had a chance to make it all the way to the championship finals, but Chastain was going to be eliminated from contention by just two points. Instead of accepting defeat like a sane person would do, Chastain took a different approach.
As the field slammed on the brakes, downshifting as they entered the tight Turns 3 and 4 of the small half-mile short track, Chastain upshifted into fifth instead. He kept the pedal mashed to the floor, pinning the car against the outside wall and grinding against it as the car slingshot around the outermost bounds of the race track. He let go of the wheel and even admitted to his vision getting blurry as he passed five cars and shattered the track record. Chastain made the Championship 4, and that move was viewed over 200 million times across social media. To this day, engagement-driven accounts that have nothing to do with racing promote the video because it’s simply unbelievable and an easy way to get views.
Chastain’s move propelled the team to a runner-up finish in the championship, coming 356 feet shy of the crown.
Winning the closest three-wide photo finish in NASCAR history
Watch: Hear FOX Sports Latin America’s call of Daniel Suárez’s wild Atlanta win
Daniel Suarez was the team’s original driver in NASCAR, and the first Mexican-born driver to ever win in the Cup Series. In 2024, he was involved in a photo finish that looked like it was pulled right out of the movie, Cars. Suarez crossed the line in a three-wide photo finish for the ages, racing to the checkered flag alongside Ryan Blaney and Kyle Busch in what seemed like a trio of fighter pilots flying in formation.
Suarez won the race of course — his first on an oval. In doing so, he also became the first foreign-born driver to win an oval race in the Cup Series since Canadian Earl Ross did it in 1974. But this race was also the closest three-wide photo finish in the history of the entire sport. Suarez beat Blaney by just 0.003s, and Busch in third was a mere 0.007s behind.
Disrupting the NASCAR championship race like never before
Watch: Chastain on racing Blaney hard in title race: ‘I know he’s mad, and I do not care’
In modern NASCAR, the season ends with four finalists in a winner-take-all race at Phoenix Raceway (and previously Homestead-Miami Speedway. It’s not a points race for these Championship 4 drivers, as whichever one of them finishes higher is crowned champion. Therefore, it should be no surprise that the winner of the season finale every year since this format was introduced in 2014 has also been the champion…except for one time.
Chastain was eliminated halfway through the playoffs in 2023, but that doesn’t mean you go home. The rest of the field is still out there racing while the four title combatants battle it out. Chastain happily inserted himself into that battle, drawing the ire of eventual champion Ryan Blaney, who flipped him as they battled in a full-contact fight for the lead. On the final restart, he drove right on by fellow Chevy (and another Championship 4 driver) Kyle Larson to take the lead, and eventually held off Blaney for the race win. The broadcast team struggled with how to call the finish as their attention was split between the champion in second, and the driver who was actually winning the race.
From last to first in a backup car to win NASCAR’s longest race
Watch: Ross Chastain makes daring move to win 2025 Coca-Cola 600
Chastain appears a few times on this list because he is always so full of surprises (just look at the recent Round of 12 elimination race at the Charlotte Roval), but earlier this year, he earned Trackhouse its biggest win in NASCAR yet. And the way they did it was rather unconventional.
In practice for the 2025 Coca-Cola 600 — NASCAR’s longest race at 600 miles (roughly 966km), the No. 1 car driven by Chastain crashed with a tire failure. The team worked throughout the night to get the backup car ready for this crown jewel event, knowing they were going to start 40th — last in the field.
The car was readied, and Chastain slowly progressed through the field. He was 20th by the end of Stage 1, 10th by the end of Stage 2, and fifth by the end of Stage 3. In the fourth and final stage, he snatched the lead away from William Byron with less than ten miles left in the grueling event. He went on to capture the checkered flag, leading just eight of 400 laps, and smashing a watermelon as the eighth-generation farmer always does when he is victorious.
Fernandez stuns with MotoGP triumph
Raul Fernandez, Trackhouse Racing
Photo by: Robert Cianflone / Getty Images
And the team’s most recent shocker happened in the most recent round of MotoGP. Raul Fernandez was starting his 76th career grand prizx, having never finished higher than fifth. Trackhouse’s MotoGP effort is less than two years old, and they’ve never scored a podium.
However, after starting fourth in the Australian Grand Prix at Phillip Island, he jumped up to second rather quickly with Marco Bezzecchi just ahead of him. Bezzecchi had to serve a penalty that later dropped him down the order, and opened the door for Fernandez. The Trackhouse rider held onto the race lead with a firm grip, maintaining a wicked pace throughout the event. While there were concerns that he would burn the rear tires off, he managed it perfectly, taking the win by 1.4 seconds over Fabio di Giannantonio. It was a stunning triumph that few saw coming, and Fernandez could hardly contain his excitement once he ascended the top step of the podium.
Along with 14 NASCAR Cup wins courtesy of Chastain, Van Gisbergen, and Suarez, the team now has one MotoGP victory thanks to Fernandez. All four drivers come from different countries as well, representing the USA (Chastain), New Zealand (SVG), Mexico (Suarez), and Spain (Fernandez).
Watch: Raul Fernandez wins the Australian GP!
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