2025 Focused Health 250 Race Picks

Date/Time: Saturday March 1st, 2025. 2:30PM (EST)
Where: Circuit of the Americas (COTA)
TV: CW

After two straight weeks of superspeedway racing to open the season, NASCAR’s Xfinity and Cup Series will make a stop in Austin, Texas this weekend for road course racing at Circuit of the Americas (COTA). The action will kick off on Saturday when the Xfinity Series waves the green flag for the Focused Health 250 in a race that will feature numerous Cup Series talents who will be looking for extra seat time in preparation for Sunday’s EchoPark Texas Grand Prix. Despite the abundance of Cup Series talent in the Focused Health 250, it may be an Xfinity Series rookie that everyone is chasing!

For Saturday’s Xfinity Series field, Ross Chastain, William Byron, Riley Herbst, and Carson Hocevar are among the names that will be competing. Chastain and Byron are obviously the biggest names in that group and both drivers are former Cup Series winners at COTA. More importantly, both Chastain and Byron will be piloting excellent equipment this weekend with Chastain behind the wheel of the #9 car for J.R. Motorsports and Byron behind the wheel of the #17 for Hendrick Motorsports. Despite those heavy hitters, it appears that the field will be chasing rookie Connor Zilisch who won the pole for Saturday’s Focused Health 250 by a relatively wide margin!

For bettors that may be unfamiliar with the young phenom, Zilisch is one of the most talented road course drivers in the sport despite his limited experience in NASCAR. Zilisch has a very prestigious road course background and won his Xfinity Series debut last year at Watkins Glen. Before the season began, I urged bettors to take the over 1.5 wins on Zilisch due to his superior road course talent and I firmly believe he will be the guy to beat throughout the entire 2025 Xfinity Series campaign at these road course style layouts. In practice and qualifying on Friday, Zilisch showed tremendous speed to prove that theory may be true. While there is still a lot of racing that could change things, Zilisch enters Saturday’s race as a deserving big favorite based on the dominating type of speed he has shown thus far!

Betting Strategy

In the last few weeks, I have urged bettors to chase value because that is simply the best long-term strategy for superspeedway racing. For this week’s race at COTA, our betting strategy completely changes. Instead of chasing value towards dark horses who have similar winning probability as the favorites at the superspeedways, this week we will solely focus on the best drivers/talents at the road courses. Admittedly, this is not the most fun strategy from an ROI standpoint because we are seemingly putting most of our eggs in one basket. However, history tells us that these road course races are dominated by the drivers with the best road course skill set. As a result, I will increase my risk this week with more confidence despite the ROI concerns.

Practice Observations

If you watched practice on Friday, Connor Zilisch was absolutely dominant throughout every stage of the afternoon. Through the opening 20 minutes, Zilisch led all competitors by over a full second on the stop watch and that includes COTA’s shortened 2025 layout which is smaller in size. Once rubber started laying into the track and cars elected to bolt on new tires, Ross Chastain, Jesse Love, and a few others leapfrogged the leaders. However, Zilisch then laid down a lap that was a half-second faster than the entire field which is the way practice ended. Needless to say, Zilisch is undoubtedly the driver to beat.

Behind Zilisch, I thought Ross Chastain looked really solid. Behind Chastain, the group of Jesse Love, Austin Hill, William Byron, Taylor Gray, and Carson Kvapil were all in close proximity. Byron is the name that stands out in that group from a prestigious perspective. However, I personally thought Gray and Hill were consistently as fast as Byron. On the other side of the coin, Sheldon Creed, Brandon Jones, and Riley Herbst were among the names that I thought were much further down the speed charts than most people would expect. Herbst and Jones have never been great road course talents however both drivers were also outside the top 25 in practice speeds which is inexcusable. Meanwhile, Sheldon Creed has actually been very solid at the road course venues throughout his Xfinity Series career. However, the #00 did not show a ton of speed on Friday which raises the concerns around a driver that I had on my radar from a dark horse perspective going into the week.

Betting Targets

There is obviously not any betting value on Zilisch going into Saturday but I don’t think that should deter bettors based on his winning probability. I think Zilisch has to get wrecked, have equipment failure, and have some crazy strategy luck go wrong on Saturday to keep him out of victory lane. For that reason, I don’t mind placing some multi-unit wagers on the young phenom. However if Zilisch does have misfortune, I would believe Chastain has the best chance to steal the victory. Chastain is the only driver that I believe could beat Zilisch straight-up under the right circumstances and bettors should not forget that Chastain has been extremely good at COTA in Cup Series competition. Now driving with J.R. Motorsports for the first time in Xfinity Series competition, I would expect Chastain to get better as the race progresses on Saturday.

Behind the top two guys, I don’t have any drivers that are screaming for betting attention. William Byron is obviously in-consideration but I simply don’t like the betting value on a guy that I consider a 3rd-best favorite, at best, going into Saturday. If you are looking at drivers that could provide value in H2H formats, I believe the RCR teammates of Austin Hill and Jesse Love have some solid upside despite failing to make it to the final round of qualifying on Friday. Hill finished in the runner-up position in this race last year. While I don’t believe he will replicate last year’s results, Hill and Love have top 5 ceilings. Likewise, Taylor Gray may be another driver with top 5 upside. Due to Gray’s limited experience, I would look for higher ROI style prop bets as opposed to H2H formats.

Draftkings Focused Health 250 Optimal Fantasy Lineup

2025 Focused Health 250 Betting Picks

*More picks may be added closer to race time. Continue to check back until “FINAL” status is displayed* Connor Zilisch -160 (2.5 units)
Ross Chastain +450 (1 unit)