Last week, Christopher Bell earned his 4th win of the season following a wild race at Bristol Motor Speedway to conclude the opening round of the playoffs. The results of that race officially ended the championship hopes for Alex Bowman, Austin Dillon, Shane Van Gisbergen, and Josh Berry. On Sunday, the Cup Series will move into the Round of 12 in the playoffs when the green flag waves for Mobil 1 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. As we prepare for more playoff racing, we turn our focus towards breaking down betting odds and the drivers that could help us make a profit in Loudon!
Before we dive into all things New Hampshire, let’s first state the obvious. Last week’s race at Bristol was very chaotic due to excessive tire wear which resulted in drivers/teams needing to pit every 50 or so laps. Personally, I would love to see more tire wear in the Cup Series on a consistent basis because it is more handicapping friendly as opposed to the battle of track position which we see most weekends. While last week’s race was encouraging from the tire wear perspective, we should not expect any type of encore scenario in Loudon.
Though GoodYear has brought a new tire compound to New Hampshire this week, this is the same compound that has been used several times this year at Martinsville, North Wilkesboro, and Richmond. Furthermore, New Hampshire Motor Speedway has never produced a high degree of tire wear. As a result, we should expect this to be a traditional New Hampshire Motor Speedway style race where passing is very difficult and track position is critical. Our job from a handicapping perspective will be focused around identifying the drivers that typically excel at New Hampshire and other similar flat banking layouts (E.g. Martinsville, Richmond, etc.). Once we identify those drivers, we will then evaluate practice/qualifying results and betting odds to formulate our best action play towards profits!
The Cup Series held practice and qualifying sessions on Saturday immediately after the Truck Series race at New Hampshire. I mention that fact because the track had a lot of rubber from the Truck Series race and mimicked track conditions that we will eventually see on Sunday. Once both sessions concluded, Joey Logano was the driver that stood at the top of the charts. Logano earned his 2nd pole of the season with a fast lap of 130.622mph and will have the luxury of leading the field to the green flag on Sunday. Behind Logano, teammate Ryan Blaney is on the outside pole. Meanwhile, Josh Berry, Tyler Reddick, and William Byron rounded out the top 5 starting positions.
Specifically in practice, William Byron posted the fastest lap of the session. Single lap speeds were somewhat misleading because the opening group had the more favorable track conditions. In terms of race speed, Ryan Blaney appeared to have the best consistency among the fastest guys. Blaney led almost every consecutive lap category and clearly looked like the best car. Behind Blaney, the Hendrick Motorsports’ cars of William Byron, Chase Elliott, and Kyle Larson all showed a lot of speed. HMS has not traditionally been strong at NHMS but all 3 of those drivers looked really solid speed especially firing off. Meanwhile, Joey Logano, Josh Berry, and Denny Hamlin were among the other notable drivers that appeared to show strong speed on the stopwatch. On the other side of the coin, Chase Briscoe, Christopher Bell, and Ross Chastain were among names that have been strong in recent races at NHMS but did not show the speed we were expecting, at least from a practice perspective.
Going into the weekend, I was focused on having some type of exposure to Christopher Bell. While Bell did not exactly look overly impressive in practice or qualifying on Saturday, he has been the best driver at NHMS by a very wide margin. Since I do have Bell on the 2nd leg of a parlay from the truck race on Saturday, I am not going to add any additional exposure. However, I would not blame anyone for putting Bell on their betting card at his current 9-1 odds. It’s not normal that you get a driver at 9-1 odds that has been so dominant, therefore I wanted to state that for everyone considering backing Bell again on Sunday. With that being stated, I do believe Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano are the guys to beat going into Sunday. Logano is a two-time winner at NHMS and Blaney looked amazing in practice. Additionally, Logano reportedly showed exceptional speed at NHMS in a tire test back in July. Therefore, it appears that Team Penske may have found some additional speed this week.
While Denny Hamlin and William Byron both showed strong speed on Saturday, Byron has never finished in the Top 10 and Hamlin has only finished one stage in the Top 5 in the history of the Next Gen Car at NHMS. As a result, I believe both Hamlin and Byron have winning ceilings but I don’t have any interest in their current betting odds which is saturated at less than 7-1. If I were to look for dark horses, I would look for better betting value. Tyler Reddick, Josh Berry, and Chase Elliott are sharp options. Reddick and Berry have shown strong skills at NHMS recently and both have shown very solid speed throughout the weekend. Meanwhile, Elliott is getting near 30-1 odds simply due to a bad qualifying effort. Elliott looked really strong in practice and has been 3rd best driver overall at NHMS in the Next Gen Car. For those reasons, I like the Reddick, Berry, and Elliott trio in all betting formats.
If you are looking for even deeper options, I am not confident in any long shots for Sunday’s Mobil 1 301. Ryan Preece and Zane Smith are drivers that have the best long shot value. Smith has been performing really well in recent weeks and is getting astronomical betting odds. Meanwhile, Preece is flying under the radar once again this weekend. Preece really impresses in practice/qualifying but is usually getting quality results on a raceday. Following a career best 11th place result at NHMS last year, I believe Preece may have an even bigger ceiling this week.
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