2025 Hy-Vee Perks 250 Race Picks

Date/Time: Saturday August 2nd, 2025. 4:30PM (EST)
Where: Iowa Speedway
TV: CW

On Saturday, NASCAR’s Xfinity Series will take center stage at Iowa Speedway for the running of the Hy-Vee Perks 250. Both Xfinity and Cup Series teams will be competing this weekend at Iowa Speedway with the running of the Iowa Corn 350 taking place on Sunday. As most are aware, Iowa Speedway is not one of the traditional ovals on the NASCAR schedule. The Cup Series visited Iowa for the first time last year. While the Xfinity Series competed at Iowa regularly from 2009-2019, it has only hosted one race since 2019 as well. Therefore, this track is relatively new for the majority of Xfinity Series competitors going into this weekend’s return to Newton, Iowa.

In last year’s first return to Iowa for Xfinity Series competition, Sam Mayer emerged with a victory after beating Riley Herbst and Sheldon Creed over a couple of late race restarts. While Mayer has won 7 times over the last 3 seasons, last year’s win at Iowa remains his only victory at a “short-track.” However, Mayer is winless so far this season with Team Haas and the same can be said for teammate Sheldon Creed. Due to the fact both drivers performed extremely well at Iowa last year, this could be one of Team Haas’ best chances to score their first win of the season. However, there are many additional threats in Saturday’s field including Cup Series veterans Ross Chastain, Carson Hocevar, and Austin Dillon who will fill-in for Austin Hill who was suspended following last week’s intentional wreck against Aric Almirola.

Despite some of the big names that will be competing on Saturday, perhaps the biggest storyline surrounds Connor Zilisch who will be going for a 4th consecutive victory. For those that remember, I predicted a breakout season for Zilisch with a 5-unit play for over 1.5 wins on the season. At this time, Zilisch has already racked up 4 wins and has emerged as one of the favorites in the race for the championship. If Zilisch is able to get the job done again on Saturday, the young phenom would join an extremely short list of drivers that includes Sam Ard and Noah Gragson as the only drivers in series history to win 4 consecutive races.

Handicapping Iowa

Since the Xfinity Series has only competed once at Iowa since 2019, I don’t think that historical track trends will provide much value. Justin Allgaier (2018) and Sam Mayer (2024) are the only drivers in the field that have won at Iowa. More importantly, there is just not enough track history to form a strong handicapping baseline. As a result, I believe bettors will need to combine last year’s race and this season’s performances on comparable layouts like Phoenix, Rockingham, and perhaps Dover. Once we combine all of those angles, perhaps we will establish a reliable baseline. From there, I will also be eager to see practice speeds early Saturday before we finalize our lineups!

Betting Targets

I am going to refrain from breaking out every handicapping for Saturday’s preview based on the fact that I am traveling. However, I do believe current betting odds are rated pretty fairly with Justin Allgaier and Connor Zilisch being listed as the two biggest favorites. With that being said, Ross Chastain may warrant immediate betting consideration despite being listed at just north of 5-1 odds. Chastain was very strong at Iowa last year despite driving for an underfunded team. In the same JRM equipment that has been so strong throughout the year, I believe bettors must elevate Chastain’s chances going into race day.

Personally, I would not rule out any of the Cup Series drivers because they are all piloting top tier equipment. I would like to see how Hocevar and the #11 team from Kaulig Racing unloads off the trailer before committing any betting attention. With that being said, I believe we could make strong betting arguments for drivers like Sammy Smith and Sam Mayer. Smith won earlier this year at Rockingham which I believe is the most similar track to Iowa on the schedule. Smith was also very solid at Iowa in last year’s race. As a result, I believe Smith is one of the sharper bets on the board and I really like him in H2H match-ups as well. Meanwhile, Mayer has been somewhat inconsistent this season but it appears that Team Haas has been better on the shorter layouts which likely means they have been at an equipment disadvantage at the 1.5 mile aero layouts. For that reason, I believe both Mayer and Creed have realistic winning ceilings this week.

As we approach on-track activities on Saturday, I don’t have many drivers that are screaming for dark horse consideration beyond all of the various talents listed at less than 18-1 odds. Christian Eckes, Ryan Sieg, Corey Day, and Parker Retzlaff are hitting on a few handicapping angles for dark horse consideration. However, I would really like to see confirmation with practice speeds early Saturday. The only exception is Retzlaff who is getting absolutely lottery size numbers due to his poor results over the last two months. If Retzlaff can replicate the performance from Rockingham, he can have considerable appeal in prop bet formats.