NC Education Lottery 200
NASCAR Camping World Truck Series
Date and Time: Friday May 16th, 2014 8:49PM Eastern
Where: Charlotte Motor Speedway
TV: FS1
By:NASCAR Wagers, NASCAR Handicapping Service
Charlotte Motor Speedway has a full slate of racing scheduled tonight starting with the Sprint Showdown which will feature 23 drivers battling to earn their way into the Sprint All-Star Race. The format for the Sprint Showdown will feature two 20 lap segments with an option pit stop in between both segments. In the final 20 lap segment, only green flag laps will be counted and the top two finishers will punch their ticket to Saturday night’s All-Star Race. After that excitement has concluded, the Camping World Truck Series will cap off the night with the running of the NC Education Lottery 200.
Both of Thursday’s practices for the NC Education Lottery 200 were cancelled due to heavy rain limiting track time for Truck Series drivers. However, drivers were able to participate in an extended final practice earlier this morning at Charlotte Motor Speedway which gives us some data to review for tonight’s race. Without much surprise, Kyle Busch topped the charts in practice with a lap of 180.820mph. Ryan Blaney, Timothy Peters, Brad Keselowski, Matt Crafton, Darrell Wallace Jr, Ron Hornaday, Johnny Sauter, Brian Icklet, and Max Gresham rounded out the top 10.
Obviously Busch topping the charts was not very surprising considering his dominance in both the Camping World Truck and Nationwide Series. Busch captured his first Kansas win last week in the Truck Series and now looks to make it two in a row tonight at Charlotte. Busch is the defending winner of the NC Education Lottery 200 and Charlotte Motor Speedway has been one of his best 1.5 tracks through any racing series.
Busch was already a heavy favorite for tonight’s event and his odds have not budged at 1.5 to 1. Normally we do not like taking any driver at such low odds but we are going to shake things up tonight based off this morning’s practice observations. Ryan Blaney was able to post a few quick laps this morning while both Brad Keselowski and Matt Crafton were solid in race trim. However nobody was remotely close to Busch in terms of lap times. During the early and late portions of the 2 hour practice, Busch was consistently 2-3 tenths faster on average. Sure the track will change a bit once the sun goes down tonight but 2-3 tenths is a huge variance in terms of lap times. Therefore we are going to ride shotgun with Rowdy tonight in hopes a decent payout.
NASCARWAGERS Picks to Win:
Kyle Busch +150 (3 units): Defending winner, exceptional in practice.
H2H Bets
Check back closer to race time