2022 Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 Race Picks

NASCAR Cup Series Betting Predictions
Date/Time: Sunday March 20th, 2022. 3:00PM (EST)
Where: Atlanta Motor Speedway
TV: FOX

On Sunday, the dawn of a new era in racing will take place at Atlanta Motor Speedway with the running of the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500. The former rugged 1.5 mile layout at Atlanta has been transformed into a mini superspeedway as the result of a reconfiguration that yielded added banking in the corners and a new layer of asphalt. In fact, for the first time in recent memory NASCAR will run the same rules package at Atlanta that they run at the superspeedways of Daytona and Talladega. Needless to say, Sunday’s Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 will be a unique spectacle for the newly designed Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Unfortunately, I don’t believe Sunday’s race at Atlanta will provide many advantage plays for bettors. In today’s Nalley Cars 250 in the Xfinity Series, we got to see the first taste of stockcar action at Atlanta. I said in my preview to the Nalley Cars 250 that I expected the race to unfold as a hybrid between former 1.5 mile racing and superspeedway style racing. I believe that is a fairly accurate depiction of what transpired in the Xfinity Series race. We saw a lot of side by side racing but it was not like the 3-4 wide pack racing often witnessed at the superspeedways. In fact, today’s Xfinity Series race was more along the lines of combination of track position, optimal strategy, and getting the right pushes on restarts.

In the Nalley Cars 250, we witnessed drivers struggling to make passes and work their way forward without teammate help. The racing groove has been narrowed at Atlanta due to the reconfiguration and it definitely appeared drivers were having difficulty passing in today’s races between the Truck Series and Xfinity Series. With passing being difficult and track position being key, we could see an unlimited amount of scenarios unfold at Atlanta on Sunday. The Next Gen Car is designed almost identically from organization to organization. Since drivers are basically full-throttle every lap, there is not much the driver can do to make up time on the race track. Therefore, the degree of variance between competitors is minimal and that could produce a lottery style type of racing as competitors jockey track position and different pit strategies. Obviously teammate help will be important on Sunday but I don’t believe we can have a high degree of confidence of what to expect with this maximum amount of parity with the new car combined with a speedway that plays heavily into the parity narrative as well.

Betting Strategy

While I don’t believe the racing will completely mirror superspeedway racing, predicting the outcome of Sunday’s Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 might as well be chalked up to a traditional superspeedway event. From a competition standpoint, I feel like 25 cars have a legitimate shot to win this race under the right conditions. As a result, I am going to approach Sunday’s race at Atlanta with a superspeedway mindset. I will sprinkle some low risk/high reward plays into my lineup based on value and also downgrade my normal overall risk capacity. Hopefully we capture some luck with our educated guesses but to give everyone a full transparency disclosure; these are not highly confident plays.

Practice Observations

Cup Series’ teams participated in a 50 minute practice session on Saturday and I would basically call it a “learning” session more than anything. The first 10-15 minutes, we saw mostly 2-3 car packs running together to get a feel of Atlanta’s new layout. Towards the latter stages of practice, we had the majority of the cars on track running mostly two-wide throughout the field. We saw drivers like Corey LaJoie, Bubba Wallace, and Erik Jones run at the front of some of the bigger packs which preaches the fact that anyone can win this event. Based on practice, I would imagine the racing will look a lot like the Xfinity Series event where the outside groove is preferred but we will also have a lot of two-wide racing as teams try to make moves on the bottom of the track.

In terms of overall speed, I really don’t know if practice speeds shed any true “indicators.” I’m actually fearful that practice speeds may be more misleading than anything. For example, the Joe Gibbs Racing cars took home 4 of the top 9 fastest speeds in today’s practice. However, the JGR cars were also on the track together for an extended period of time. Furthermore, those cars were at the front of the larger pack that contributed towards the end of practice. Therefore, I question if the JGR cars were truly faster or if it was just a product of their situational positions on the track.

One thing that I did notice is that the Hendrick Motorsports cars were not very high on the speed charts. Personally, I thought those cars may stand out this week due to their single car speed at Daytona. Instead, Chase Elliott was the only Hendrick Motorsports driver to crack the top 20 in practice. During the telecast, I specifically heard William Byron and Alex Bowman complaining of being “tight.” In this new wide open format at Atlanta, being “tight” could be a driver’s worst enemy as that means they will likely have to lift more than others especially in the draft. Either way, Hendrick Motorsports’ cars were not trending in the right direction in today’s lone practice.

Betting Targets

Based on the observations noted above and the style of racing that I expect to play out on Sunday, I would not label many drivers true “betting targets.” I think we have to keep an open mind about the number of drivers that could contend on Sunday as we continue our learning curve with the Next Gen Car and add in the learning curve of the new Atlanta. As a result, I am mainly going to focus on drivers that could produce extreme value in the terms of win (futures) and prop style bets. For example, I mentioned Corey LaJoie earlier as a driver that stood out in practice and was consistently at the front of the larger pack of cars. Currently, LaJoie is receiving 15 to 1 odds for a top 5 finish and nearly 4 to 1 odds for a top 10 finish. Both of those prop lines have significant value based simply off analytics.

I think it is important that handicappers admit when there is not an edge and that is how I feel about predicting a winner for Sunday’s race. However, that does not mean we cannot look at the LaJoie types of values across the board and take some chances. Among the big dark horses like LaJoie, I also have positive reservations for the likes of Todd Gilliland and Noah Gragson as young drivers that could make a splash on Sunday. Meanwhile, more realistic value options include guys like Tyler Reddick, Brad Keselowski, and Cole Custer among others. If I had to back any of the favorites, I would probably side with Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano above any of the others. I feel like Blaney and Logano have been the best duo at this style of racing over the last few years therefore neither driver can be overlooked.

Draftkings Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 Optimal Lineup

2022 Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 Race Picks

*More plays to be added closer to race time. Check back until “Final” status is displayed*

Ryan Blaney +1000 (.75 unit)
Joey Logano +1200 (.75 unit)
Tyler Reddick +1500 (.5 unit)
Brad Keselowski +2200 (.5 unit)
Erik Jones +5000 (.25 unit)
Cole Custer +8000 (.25 unit)

H2H Match-ups and Props

Noah Gragson +1200 finishes Top 5 (.5 unit)
Corey LaJoie +1500 finishes Top 5 (.5 unit)
Bubba Wallace +550 finishes as highest Toyota performer (.5 unit)
Christopher Bell +650 finishes as highest Toyota performer (.5 unit)