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This one is for bragging rights. Well, that and the money.
With the exception of 1986, every All-star race from its inception one year earlier through the pandemic year of 2020 was run at Charlotte Motor Speedway. As NASCAR scrambled to find suitable places to race during that challenging summer, Bristol Motor Speedway was selected and it opened up the opportunity to move the race around.
Both Charlotte and Bristol are Speedway Motorsports Incorporated properties, and with Texas Motor Speedway entering into a cooperative agreement to race at Circuit of the Americas (COTA), they moved the All-star race last year. This will be the second running of the Texas version of this winner-take-all exhibition race.
Drivers will do a lot in the All-star race they wouldn’t otherwise, and this event lives up the hype. It’s a checkers-or-wreckers, bring-back-the-steering-wheel-or-the-trophy kind of race. And it’s going to play out under a hot Texas moon.
Proposed Winner
We’re not necessarily going to get stuck on Kyle Larson (+540) as a weekly favorite. This is a team that has made their fair share of mistakes. Larson has his own mistakes, but ultimately the success or failure of the team falls on the driver’s shoulder. We saw the pressure of that last week through all of the dramatic moments during his drive toward the front.
In the closing laps, losing to Kurt Busch seemed almost an inevitability. Busch sat 21st in the points after Darlington Raceway and with only six spots open for drivers to earn their way in on points, he knew the 54 points were going to be hard to earn so he could climb above a bubble that moves every week.
But Larson did not roll over. He scraped the wall as the two battled for the lead and earlier in the race had one of the best saves we’ve seen in decades. That kind of reckless abandon is precisely what it takes to win the All-star race.
Larson won the last two All-star races he was in, at Charlotte in 2019 and Texas last year.
Other Strong Bets
Joey Logano (+1600) has had a mostly disappointing year, which is one of the reasons he made the decision he made at Darlington. With the pressure of points off his shoulders for now, he can go for broke. Logano has finished in the top 10 in all but one of 11 starts, which is an average of .909. He won the 2016 edition of this race and hasn’t finished worse than eighth since. His last three efforts at Charlotte and Texas ended in the top-five. At 16/1, he’s well worth the squeeze.
How could anyone even think about not making Kyle Busch (+800) a favorite. Coming off last week’s near-miss at Kansas Speedway – another similarly-configured, 1.5-mile track – he will be even hungrier to win a second race of 2022. He won’t care that it’s an exhibition race; if he has a chance to take the lead the other drivers had better be aware. Like Logano, Busch has a seven-race streak of top-10s on this track. He won at Charlotte in 2017 and finished second in the Birstol version in 2020.
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A rash of tire failures that collected drivers at various stages of last week’s AdventHealth 400 finally claimed Chase Elliott (+850) near the end of the event – too late to overcome after he stalled in the mud and lost three laps. He had a strong run prior to that and remains the points’ leader. This is great time for him to reclaim his momentum before points are on the line again in Charlotte. Elliott’s All-star win came in 2020 on the Birstol short track, but he’s finished seventh or better in all but one of six attempts.
Racing is often filled with irony. As Kevin Harvick (+2200) struggles to snap his winless streak, he could earn one that doesn’t quite count against that record at Texas. Harvick won his second All-star race in 2018 and followed it with a second-place finish in 2019 at Charlotte and a third at Bristol in 2020. He didn’t perform particularly well at Texas last year and earned a 15th-place finish after starting 12th.
It won’t him separate from the bubble, but Aric Almirola (+5000) could get a boost of confidence with a strong All-star run. He’s qualified for the big show in the last three editions and swept the top 10. His best finish of sixth came on the 1.5-mile track in Charlotte. He’s one of 20 drivers who will not have to race their way in via the open and that should help him concentrate on the matter at hand.
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Best Bets for 2022 AdventHealth 400 [Kansas 1]
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