NASCAR team confirms eighth driver change of 2024 at Talladega
By Asher Fair
The 2024 NASCAR Cup Series season is set for its 10th race this Sunday afternoon at Talladega Superspeedway. Just once so far this season has the driver of the No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet been the same from one race to the next, and that will once again not be the case for the GEICO 500.
Shane van Gisbergen, the full-time Kaulig Racing Xfinity Series driver who made his Cup Series season debut at Circuit of the Americas in March, is set to get his first taste of Cup Series superspeedway action in this weekend's 188-lap race around the four-turn, 2.66-mile (4.281-kilometer) high-banked Lincoln, Alabama oval.
Van Gisbergen is one of five drivers to drive the No. 16 Chevrolet through the season's first nine races. Full-time Xfinity Series teammates A.J. Allmendinger and Josh Williams have driven it in two races each.
Kaulig Racing's No. 16 Chevrolet continues to change hands
Derek Kraus and Ty Dillon have also made two appearances, with Kraus' starts at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and Phoenix Raceway in March marking the only instance so far this season in which the driver of the car did not change after a race weekend. Dillon is the most recent driver of the No. 16 Chevrolet, having competed at Texas Motor Speedway this past weekend.
No driver has been confirmed for the No. 16 Chevrolet for next weekend's race at Dover Motor Speedway. After this weekend, there are 26 races remaining on the schedule, and a driver of the car has only been named for 13 of them. Van Gisbergen has six more scheduled starts while Kraus has four and Dillon has three.
Kaulig Racing have fielded a non-charter entry, the No. 13 Chevrolet, once this year, doing so for Allmendinger at Circuit of the Americas, but they have not publicized any plans to bring that car back.
The only other shared charter car is the No. 15 Rick Ware Racing Ford, which hasn't seen a driver change since Kaz Grala took over from Riley Herbst after the season-opening Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway. However, Cody Ware is set to drive the car this weekend, marking his first start in over a year.
Fox is set to provide live coverage of Sunday afternoon's GEICO 500 from Talladega Superspeedway starting at 3:00 p.m. ET. Start a free trial of FuboTV now and don't miss it.