2022 Alsco Uniforms 302 Race Picks

NASCAR Xfinity Series Betting Predictions
Date/Time: Saturday October 15th, 2022. 3:00PM (EST)
Where: Las Vegas Motor Speedway
TV: NBC

On Saturday, NASCAR’s Xfinity Series will take center stage at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with the running of the Alsco Uniforms 302 to kick off the Round of 8 in the NASCAR playoffs. The Xfinity Series has been somewhat dominated by the top 4 drivers in Noah Gragson (7), AJ Allmendinger (5), Ty Gibbs (5), and Justin Allgaier (3) who have combined for 20 victories. The question is will those 4 drivers make it to Phoenix to battle for a championship or will another contender emerge from the group of drivers that include Josh Berry, Austin Hill, Brandon Jones, and/or Sam Mayer?

Back in March, Ty Gibbs earned his 1st victory of the season, in the 3rd race of the season, at Las Vegas Motor Speedway by capturing a win in the Alsco Uniforms 300. Despite the majority of the race being dominated by Noah Gragson and Justin Allgaier, Gibbs was able to take advantage of a couple of chaotic late-race restarts to steal the victory. For Saturday’s return to Vegas, the stakes have been raised because a victory would lock any of the playoff contenders into the Championship 4 at Phoenix for a chance at a championship.

Currently betting odds are pretty top-heavy among the favorites and I can’t say that I blame odds-makers as all of the top guys in Allmendinger, Gragson, Gibbs, and Allgaier were impressive at Vegas back in the March race. Of course a lot of time has passed since the trip to Vegas back in March but those same drivers have been equally impressive in recent weeks especially Noah Gragson. As a result, I’m not sure bettors are going to find much value this week towards win (futures) odds unless we pivot to some of the dark horses. For now, I think our main opportunities will come in the form of H2H match-ups and that’s where we will look at the 1.5 mile loop data and on-track observations from earlier to identify betting value to carry into Saturday.

1.5 Mile Loop Data

Since we have witnessed a big gap of time between the trip to Vegas back in March and now, I wanted to refresh the stats on our 1.5 mile loop data to include the most recent race at a 1.5 mile venue which was Texas a few weeks ago. With the update, I can’t say that much has changed from the prior trends. The J.R. Motorsports cars continued to show a clear performance advantage at the 1.5 mile venues with 3 of the top 4 positions in terms of average driving rating. Former Vegas winner Ty Gibbs is the only driver that has posted similar performance to break up the J.R. Motorsports drivers in the top 4.

It is worth noting that John Hunter Nemechek is ranked pretty high in our loop data statistics. However, it is important to call out that both of Nemechek’s starts in this data set was behind the #18 for Joe Gibbs Racing. Nemechek will be in action this week but perhaps takes a step down in equipment behind the #26 for Sam Hunt Racing. Other potential noteworthy mentions based on the loop data surround solid results from Austin Hill who has been performing extremely well during the 2nd half of the season. Meanwhile, drivers like Brandon Jones, Landon Cassill, and Ryan Sieg appear to be on the wrong side of the performance metrics vs. equipment/expectations equation.

Driver	Avg. Rating	Avg. Start	Avg. Mid Race	Avg. Finish	Avg. Pos.	Pass Diff.	Fastest Lap	Laps Led	Total Laps
Noah Gragson	121.3	3.8	8.4	8.8	8.8	83	137	225	788
Justin Allgaier	114.7	7.8	3.8	9.4	7.0	88	91	158	775
Ty Gibbs	112.3	12.8	6.0	4.2	8.8	145	85	75	860
Josh Berry	109.4	8.0	5.2	5.0	7.4	67	67	135	860
John Hunter Nemechek	104.3	7.0	3.0	20.0	11.5	20	19	60	316
AJ Allmendinger	100.9	6.6	9.0	9.4	8.2	14	29	66	858
Sam Mayer	100.6	6.4	9.0	9.6	8.2	25	26	27	858
Austin Hill	96.4	10.6	5.2	13.0	8.2	36	12	33	847
Daniel Hemric	92.5	7.4	11.0	13.0	12.0	10	8	12	776
Brandon Jones	90.9	6.4	11.2	14.2	10.8	53	10	8	775
Riley Herbst	84.1	14.6	12.4	13.6	13.0	26	11	0	856
Sheldon Creed	82.1	12.6	18.4	11.8	14.6	47	6	5	858
Landon Cassill	81.5	16.2	16.8	18.2	17.6	52	4	0	700
Jeb Burton	68.0	21.8	17.4	19.4	18.6	18	0	5	814
Myatt Snider	63.4	29.0	17.0	18.4	19.2	-12	0	0	853
Brandon Brown	63.3	23.0	21.8	20.6	21.4	1	0	3	782
Jeremy Clements	62.9	16.2	23.8	21.2	20.2	-32	3	0	735
Bayley Currey	60.4	23.0	21.2	20.8	22.0	-43	0	0	853
Ryan Sieg	59.9	16.2	23.8	25.4	22.6	-23	0	0	555
Anthony Alfredo	56.8	27.8	22.4	23.8	21.8	3	0	0	735
Stefan Parsons	53.2	23.2	23.8	24.0	24.2	-34	0	0	745
Josh Williams	52.2	27.3	23.8	24.3	24.0	-26	1	0	552
J.J. Yeley	51.7	23.2	25.4	25.0	24.4	-43	0	0	724
Kyle Weatherman	48.3	20.7	30.7	28.0	26.3	6	0	0	378
Mason Massey	45.8	28.5	31.0	27.0	27.5	-58	0	0	569
Matt Mills	44.0	28.0	27.5	27.3	28.5	-53	0	0	566
C.J. McLaughlin	41.1	33.8	32.2	23.2	29.4	-15	0	0	850
Brennan Poole	34.2	25.8	29.0	35.3	32.5	-15	1	0	263
Ryan Vargas	33.6	28.5	33.8	32.5	32.5	-23	0	0	467

Betting Targets

At the time of this writing, practices have not taken place at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. I wanted to get this preview out beforehand because I do think there are a couple valuable lines that may lose value after on-track sessions. Currently, I do believe Noah Gragson is the clear favorite to win Saturday’s Alsco Uniforms 302. If we get some more late race restarts like we did in the March race, it will strengthen the opportunities for a different winner. However if things go green for most of Saturday’s race, I think Gragson and Allgaier will be the cars to beat simply based on performance throughout the season and the edge in performance the J.R. Motorsports cars have shown over the rest of the field.

In terms of current odds, I am a little surprised to see big numbers on AJ Allmendinger and Riley Herbst. Both drivers have been at the front of several races on the intermediate layouts this season and definitely have higher ceilings that current odds suggest. Aside from Gibbs, Allmendinger and Josh Berry are the only other prior winners in Saturday’s field. Speaking of Josh Berry, he is another potential pivot against the favorites. Berry has the performance metrics at similar tracks and equipment to get into the thick of things on Saturday. Berry has been really consistent in recent weeks with finishes of 8th or better in each of the last 6 races. The only caveat is that Berry has not led a single lap in that same timeframe.

In terms of H2H betting targets, I really like Austin Hill in betting formats this week based on current match-ups. Hill has not been as consistent as some of the other playoff drivers but is coming off one of his best 1.5 mile performances of the season which resulted in a runner-up finish at Texas just two weeks ago. I think the #21 team have found speed and while it has not always shown in the final results, Hill has been running much better in terms of average running position. Along with Hill, Trevor Bayne is another good H2H pivot option as well. Bayne has finished 3rd or better in 4 of his 7 starts in the Xfinity Series this season for Joe Gibbs Racing and will have another promising opportunity on Saturday. Deeper options throughout the field for both H2H/fantasy purposes include Kyle Weatherman and Stefan Parsons who have been far exceeding expectations over the last several events.

Practice Observations

Update: Practice and impound qualifying wrapped up just an hour ago at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. In qualifying, AJ Allmendinger edged Trevor Bayne for the pole with a lap of 181.720mph. Keep in mind, track conditions were pretty cool in the evening hours of practice/qualifying which will be different from the expected race conditions on Saturday. With that being said, Ty Gibbs did appear to have the best overall speed. The impressive part about that observation is that Gibbs’ appeared really fast despite struggling with the handling conditions. It just appeared that the car had raw speed and that could be dangerous on Saturday especially if the handling improves.

Additional names that were also impressive on the stopwatch included the likes of John Hunter Nemechek, Noah Gragson, and Trevor Bayne among those that showed “winning” type speed. Personally, I was a little surprised to see Nemechek’s lap times as I documented he will be piloting potential inferior equipment this week. However, Nemechek appeared to erase any equipment concerns. On the other side of the spectrum, guys like Josh Berry, Landon Cassill, and Brandon Jones appeared to struggle much more than expected.

Draftkings Alsco Uniforms 302 Optimal Lineup

2022 Alsco Uniforms 302 Race Picks

*Final*

Ty Gibbs +300 (1.5 units)
AJ Allmendinger +1200 (1 unit)
Josh Berry +1800 (.5 unit)
Riley Herbst +4000 (.5 unit)

H2H Match-ups and Props

Austin Hill -120 over John Hunter Nemechek (3 units)
Riley Herbst +350 finishes Top 5 (1 unit)