2014 Food City 500 Early Preview

Food City 500 Early Odds:

Kyle Busch +400

Brad Keselowski +600

Kevin Harvick +850

Jimmie Johnson +850

Matt Kenseth +975

Kasey Kahne +1200

Dale Earnhardt Jr +1200

Jeff Gordon +1400

Denny Hamlin +1400

Joey Logano +1400

Kurt Busch +1500

Clint Bowyer +1950

Ryan Newman +2250

Carl Edwards +2250

Brian Vickers +3000

Greg Biffle +3500

Tony Stewart +3500

Martin Truex Jr +4500

Unsurprisingly, Kyle Busch opened as the leading favorite for the Food City 500 this Sunday at Bristol. ‘Rowdy’ has posted 5 career wins and posted a 9.89 average finish which is the best among all active drivers. While nobody in their right mind would deny Kyle’s strength at Bristol, Joe Gibbs Racing has not been thoroughly impressive through the first few weeks of racing. While Denny Hamlin finished 2nd in the Daytona 500, neither Kyle nor Matt Kenseth has cracked the top 5 this season. Kenseth won the Irwin Tools Night Race last year at Bristol and was running 2nd in this race last year before getting caught up in a wreck. Kenseth had a breakout season in 2013 and run well nearly everywhere. Still, Kenseth has posted 11 Top 5’s in his 28 career races along with 3 trips to victory lane at Bristol.

With the way the Gibbs cars have been running, there is not a lot of “value” in their odds outside of Hamlin at 14-1 currently. Last week’s winner Brad Keselowski is the 2nd leading favorite behind Busch at 6-1 odds. Keselowski captured a win last week at Las Vegas by passing Dale Earnhardt Jr as he ran out of gas on the last lap. While the win may have been a gift, Keselowski has run strong thus far in 2014 and has been solid recently at the half mile high banks of Bristol. Despite running out of gas on the final lap, Earnhardt still managed to bring home a second straight runner up finish last week in Vegas. With Earnhardt’s win in the Daytona 500 and two 2nd place finishes, he is off to the best start in his career. At 12-1 odds, Junior should be given some serious thought. Not only is Junior a very streaky racer, but Bristol is statistically his best track with an 11.54 average finish in 28 races.

A few guys, we feel you should stay away from this week include both Kevin Harvick and Jimmie Johnson for value reasons. Harvick clinched his spot in the Chase with a dominating win at Phoenix and has been strong every week. As we all know, Johnson is the best in the sport and can win on any circuit. However both guys have just 1 win each in 50 combined races at Thunder Valley. Considering the fact, both drivers are listed at rather lousy 8 ½ to 1 odds, there does not appear to be much to get excited about in terms of value. On the other hand, there are a few drivers that have a lot of value posted starting with Jeff Gordon. The driver of the #24 car has led twice as many laps (2,703) over his career than any other active driver. Gordon was leading last year’s Food City 500 before cutting a tire and finding the fence. Still, Gordon will be a strong sleeper this week at 14-1 odds which will likely get better closer to race time barring any spectacular qualifying effort.

Another driver that has some potential at tempting odds is Brian Vickers. Vickers is listed at 30-1 odds as a longshot but he has been excellent inside the half mile bullring. Vickers has posted 3 top 5’s in the last 4 races with a 5.25 average finish during that stretch. While Vickers has just 3 wins throughout his career, he did surprise a lot of people with a big victory at New Hampshire last year and it would not be inconceivable to see another breakout performance again this week. Be sure to check back after practices and qualifying for our picks for the Food City 500.