Shane van Gisbergen is Mexico City race winner

• Shane van Gisbergen won the NASCAR Cup Series race in Mexico City, securing his first win of the season and a playoff spot.

There’s something about Shane van Gisbergen and being the first.

Two years ago, he made his NASCAR Cup Series debut at the first-ever Chicago Street Race — and won it.

Sunday, as the circuit ran its first international points race since 1958 and the inaugural Cup event in Mexico, he prevailed again. He started on the pole and cleared the field by 16 seconds at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez.

Oh, and he did so while sick.

“What a week,” van Gisbergen said. “I’m really enjoying myself here. I felt pretty rubbish today, leaking out both holes. That wasn’t fun … But our car was amazing … What a pleasure just ripping lap after lap and watching them get smaller in the mirror. Unreal.”

Christopher Bell, Chase Elliott, Alex Bowman and Michael McDowell filled out the rest of the top five.

Here are three takeaways:

1. Shane van Gisbergen wins as Mexico City favorite

SVG had to have this one circled on the calendar. 

The 36-year-old Cup Series rookie had earned only one top-10 this season, and it happened 13 races ago at COTA. This was the first road course since then.

He entered the weekend 33rd in the standings, 130 points below the playoff cutline.

Now, he’s in. He’s the 10th driver to clinch a postseason spot this year.

SVG arrived in Mexico as the betting favorite, backed that up in qualifying with the fastest lap time, and then led a race-high and career-high 60 laps in his No. 88 Trackhouse Chevrolet.

“I was just trying to stay in a rhythm and a routine,” van Gisbergen said. “Man, that was epic.”

And guess what. He will compete on road courses three of the next eight weeks.

2. Chase Elliott, Alex Bowman race into top five

Not a bad day for two of the Hendrick Motorsports boys.

Elliott sped to third. Bowman ranked fourth.

For Elliott, it was his best finish of the season. He had slotted 15th in back-to-back races and had not produced a top-five result since Talladega in April. 

His performance Sunday also proved his old road-course magic still lingers within that No. 9 Chevy. He’ll continue to stand near the top of the odds boards when NASCAR hits the road.

Bowman surely hopes his fourth-place mark ends his prolonged slump. Prior to Mexico City, he stumbled to three straight finishes of 29th or worse. He placed better than 27th only twice in the previous nine races.

3. NASCAR’s back-and-forth schedule continues this week

Since leaving Nashville two weeks ago, the NASCAR caravan went north to Michigan, way south to Mexico and now goes way back north to Pocono, where all three major circuits will race next weekend — Truck Series on Friday, Xfinity on Saturday, Cup on Sunday.

After that, it’s back south to Atlanta and north again to Chicago before breaking things up in mid-July with a westward journey to Sonoma.

Got all that?

— Ken Willis contributed to this report

(This story was updated to add a gallery.)