Earlier in the week we noted just how egalitarian the road courses have become over the course of the past five years. About 70 percent of the drivers entered this week have scored at least one top-10 since the beginning of 2016 and while some of those might fit into the category of “even a blind pig finds the occasional truffle”, there are others who have consistently hovered around that mark.
NASCAR Cup racing is hard to predict at the best of times. Granted, it is a little easier on road courses where the strategy has become standardized and skill trumps horsepower, but a look at Chase Elliott’s odyssey last week underscores how mistakes can alter the outcome. If a driver is capable of hanging around the top 10 – especially if he has an occasional top-five or a recent result of sixth or seventh, a little track position and a big heart could make him a winning contender.
Even though Elliott, and more recently Kyle Larson, has become the class of the field on road courses, there are other strong bets to be had. In this week’s Best Bets post, we handicapped Christopher Bell among the top five and he should be considered a dark horse to score the outright win at +2200. Those long odds for the outright drag those for a top-three to about (~) +500 and a top-five at ~ +250. If you bet the outright win, you should cover with wagers for the other two positions.
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Of course Bell is not a traditional dark horse because of his Daytona International Speedway Road Course victory, his second-place finish at Road America, and last week’s solid showing at the Glen.
This week there are four solid contenders for top-10s who will show plus odds for that range – and one very interesting longshot.
Their names are getting mentioned a lot on road courses, but so long as the oddsmakers drag them into the positive for top-10s, Ross Chastain, Chase Briscoe, Tyler Reddick, and Matt DiBenedetto should be highlighted. They finished between ninth and 12th last week at the Glen and it’s a fair to believe they will all run equally strong at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course.
Chastain (+5000 for the outright) was the worst of the foursome last week with his 12th-place finish, but over the course of the last four road races he has been the top driver. His fourth-place finish at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) lifts his average to 7.8 and he is the only among this list with a top five. He came close on two other occasions with sevenths at Sonoma Raceway and Road America. This week his top-five odds will land somewhere in the 13/2 range and his top-10 odds are also positive.
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If you are going to bet two of the four drivers from that list for a top-10 finish, Briscoe (+5000 / outright) would be the second wager. Over the past four road races, he has an average finish of 9.5 that is drug down by a 17th at Sonoma. Toss that result out and he has three top-10s on this track type during the summer. The best of these was a sixth at COTA. His top-five odds will be somewhere in the 11/2 range with top-10 odds of ~ 3/2 and there is enough upside to those bets to make them worthy.
Tyler Reddick (+6600 / outright) will be highly motivated to roll the dice over the next three weeks. He is currently on the bubble of making the playoffs with a 15-point advantage over teammate Austin Dillon, but if there is another unique winner from below him in the standings his bubble will burst because he cannot realistically catch and pass Kevin Harvick to move up a position. We won’t know if an all-or-nothing attitude will serve him well or cause the team to make a mistake – and that should factor into the risk versus reward equation. His odds for a top-10 this week should be about ~ +200, however.
DiBenedetto (+9000 / outright) has been far less consistent overall, but he finished 10th at Road America and 11th at Watkins Glen. Like Reddick, one of the best reasons to consider him is an intangible. In the game of musical chairs at both the Cup and Xfinity levels, the seats are going fast and he is auditioning for a job. Because he has longer outright odds, those for a top-10 will be ~ +300.
A truer dark horse for a top-10 is Dillon (+20000). That’s because he has not yet scored one in 20 road course starts. He’s gotten close over the past four races, however, with a 12th at COTA, a 13th at Sonoma, an 11th at Road America, and a 15th last week at the Glen. There is a greater risk, of course, but that is why he is going to be in the ~ +700 range for a top-10 and all he needs to advance is either a little luck, or for several of the regular top contenders to struggle.
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Dark Horses for the Go Bowling at the Glen (Watkins Glen)
Jockey 250 (Road America)
Save Mart 350k (Sonoma)
