WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Saturday afternoon’s NASCAR Xfinity Series Mission 200 at the Glen at Watkins Glen International ended up being just the latest milestone in the racing career of Connor Zilisch. He showed up for his first career start with JR Motorsports, was fastest in practice, won the pole and then won the race while leading the most laps.
A sentence like that to describe a race in the Xfinity Series would likely remind people of Kyle Busch‘s most dominant races during his years with Joe Gibbs Racing. He would be in the race and everyone seemed to be racing for second.
By that point, Busch had already been full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series for years. He was able to use that skill to destroy many of the series regulars. Zilisch, on the other hand, had never raced in the series before and only has a handful of starts in NASCAR’s national-level series.
“To come out here and prove to myself that I can do it and compete at the highest levels is very special to me,” Zilisch said in his post-race press conference. “It’s hard to judge how good I am when I’m racing in ARCA … but there were five Cup guys out there today. It’s a sense of relief that I can compete out there against those guys.”
Remember, we’re talking about an 18-year-old here. He isn’t someone that’s been racing at the top level of the sport for 20 years. He’s only been racing cars in general for three years following a successful stint in karting.
Zilisch isn’t just supremely talented, but he’s also more articulate than the typical driver. I’ve had the opportunity to talk with Zilisch on a few occasions this year, the first of which was at Rolex 24 Media Day in January.
In the interview above, Zilisch discussed his schedule for 2024, which would include starts in eight different series. To this point, he’s won races in seven of them. Everything from LMP2 cars to a Mazda MX-5. Not to mention ARCA and ARCA East, Trans-Am’s TA2 class and the zMAX CARS Tour.
We’re talking many different kinds of cars here. Prototypes to stock cars to production-based race cars.
The only major series that he’s raced in this year and not won in is the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. He debuted there at Circuit of the Americas in March and set a track record in winning the pole. He then blew his tire on the first lap and ground the front sway bar off the truck. Despite losing laps, he was eventually able to finish fourth.
Zilisch claimed Saturday that the racing that he’s done with Era Motorsport in WeatherTech this season was crucial to being able to conserve the necessary fuel to make it to the end.
“I don’t think that I would have been able to [save the necessary fuel] had I not raced the prototype that I race in IMSA,” Zilisch said during his post-race press conference. “[Fuel mileage] is almost half the battle [there] in trying to get the extra lap in the stint. I kind of learned everything I did today through my team, Era Motorsport, in the [ORECA 07]. I was lifting at the flagstand [going] into turn 1 and nearly two football fields before the 600 board for the [Inner Loop]. I was rolling third gear through the [Inner Loop], never went down to second gear.
“I was just trying to do things that I know that I’ve done before. I’ve had data on my screen in the [ORECA 07]. When I save a half a liter of fuel, I have a bar that shows me these things. That was running in the back of my head [the whole time]. While I don’t have that in the Xfinity car, but I have an idea of what lifting 100 feet earlier does. That gave me the baseline of what I need to do to save fuel.”
Even though Zilisch is still very new to NASCAR, he’s already received a bucketload of praise from fellow drivers.
“His car control is phenomenal,” AJ Allmendinger said after the race … He had so much lateral grip. And as a driver, when you have that, you have confidence and that allowed him to flow so much speed in. Honestly, he was such the class of the field, you don’t really need to start taking chances. …. He’s just got phenomenal speed.”
On Friday, Zilisch was announced as the newest member of the Red Bull family of athletes. As a result, he will benefit from their marketing expertise.
Another driver in the Red Bull fold is Shane van Gisbergen. van Gisbergen gave his praises to Zilisch after the race on multiple occasions, first on pit road.
Later on, he went to victory lane to personally give his congrats. He also reportedly said that he’d like to see Zilisch in the NASCAR Cup Series race to see what he could do against all of the best drivers.
His championship-winning car owner was very impressed with his performance as well. During his winner’s press conference, team owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. could not wait until it was over to call Zilisch.
In the call, Earnhardt Jr. praised Zilisch for his abilities, congratulated him for the win and told him how much he was looking forward to having him drive for the team full-time in 2025. Zilisch thanked Earnhardt Jr. for believing in him.
In Zilisch, you have a driver that is not only mature beyond his years on the track, but mature beyond his years off of it. Assuming things go to his plan, you’re likely to be hearing Zilisch’s name for years to come.
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.