2024 Wawa 250 Race Picks

NASCAR Xfinity Series Betting Predictions
Date/Time: Friday August 23rd, 2024. 7:30PM (EST)
Where: Daytona International Speedway
TV: USA

Last week, Justin Allgaier earned his 2nd win of the season at Michigan and is now within just 8 points of Cole Custer for the outright points lead. Allgaier joined Shane Van Gisbergen, Austin Hill, Chandler Smith, and Sam Mayer as the only full-time Xfinity Series drivers with multiple wins this season and those drivers are among the favorites going into the playoffs in a couple of weeks. However, the opportunity for another win, or perhaps a first-time winner, will be broadened this Friday night when the series returns to the high-banks of Daytona International Speedway for the running of the Wawa 250.

Back in February, Austin Hill won his 3rd straight season opening race at Daytona in the United Rentals 300. As many are aware, Hill has been phenomenal at the superspeedways in the Xfinity Series. In fact, Hill has compiled 6 superspeedway wins in the last 3 years in the Xfinity Series which includes 3 victories in the February opener at Daytona. Needless to say, Hill will once again be a heavy favorite when the green flag waves late Friday as he looks for another win at Daytona. Unfortunately for bettors, Hill’s success at the superspeedways is not a secret and Hill is currently listed at less than 3-1 betting odds which is a disgusting number for a superspeedway race.

Needless to say, our betting picks will not be focused around Hill this Friday despite his incredible run at this style of racing in recent years. Typically, the superspeedway races produce more volatility which often leads to surprise winners. For those reasons, we simply cannot take the outright betting favorite at such extremely low betting odds and will be forced to look for better value. Our betting picks have hit a dry spell in recent weeks and while superspeedway racing has a higher level of unpredictability; I believe bettors can spread out picks on multiple drivers, especially those with hefty ROI potential. My hope is we get a little bit of luck this weekend and hopefully hit one of those big winners to erase the bad luck over the last few weeks.

Handicapping and Betting Strategy

I always joke that you can never make a “bad” pick at the superspeedways because these races open the door for so many long shots that essentially everyone has a true chance. While we cannot predict the big wrecks and chaos that this type of racing yields, we can look at performance data to see the drivers that consistently perform well at this style of racing. There is an art to being able to push drivers and make moves to maintain track position which is exactly what our performance metrics reflect in the average running positions and average driver ratings which are shown below. We can use this information as a main handicapping opponent to highlight the drivers that have consistently put themselves in position at the front of the field.

From a betting standpoint, the key will be breaking down those drivers that have performed relatively well and finding the best betting value in terms of betting odds. As I alluded to above, these races are very volatile. Therefore, our betting picks should account for that volatility and be reflective in our potential payoff. In other words, these are the races where you can actually lean towards better value over the better drivers. By doing so, our ROI based approach tends to win over the long-term. We may not win as often but the payouts for our winners should compensate for the difference. Just this season, we have experienced a lot of success at the superspeedways with this approach and hopefully that continues throughout the weekend for both Friday and Saturday!

Loop Data – Superspeedways

There will not be any practice sessions for the Xfinity Series or Cup Series this weekend. Both series will only hold qualifying sessions to set the starting grid. While we typically review practice speeds at the traditional ovals, I’m not sure if practice speeds really shed much insight at the superspeedways and can often be misleading. In determining some of the guys that may deserve betting consideration, I compiled loop data from the 3 races this season at the superspeedways which includes races at Daytona, Atlanta, and Talladega.

It is worth noting that the Xfinity Series will return to both Atlanta and Talladega over the next few weeks. However, the performance metrics below show all the races run thus far at the superspeedways for the 2024 Xfinity Series campaign. Obviously, these 3 races are small sample size which means outliers (early wrecks/dominating performances) can skew the metrics to a certain degree. However, I do believe this view paints a decent baseline of how teams/drivers have performed at the superspeedways thus far this season and this will be our primary handicapping tool going into Friday’s Wawa 250!

Driver	Avg. Rating	Avg. Start	Avg. Mid Race	Avg. Finish	Avg. Pos.	Pass Diff.	Fastest Lap	Laps Led	Total Laps
Austin Hill	117.3	1.7	6.3	5.3	7.0	44	12	52	413
Jesse Love	112.9	1.3	11.3	11.0	6.3	-18	18	219	413
Riley Herbst	107.5	7.7	8.7	7.7	6.7	-5	7	21	412
Parker Kligerman	95.5	4.0	15.7	24.3	12.0	19	3	11	403
Sheldon Creed	94.5	11.3	12.3	4.0	11.3	29	10	2	413
Cole Custer	90.0	10.7	8.7	13.0	9.3	-25	15	10	412
Chandler Smith	88.5	12.7	14.3	10.7	11.3	-19	16	4	412
Ryan Truex	87.7	11.3	8.3	21.3	11.3	-14	8	1	354
Sammy Smith	85.6	10.3	4.3	18.0	11.7	20	8	8	412
Anthony Alfredo	85.6	12.0	20.0	11.3	18.3	36	7	6	411
Shane Van Gisbergen	85.5	12.0	8.3	12.3	15.0	22	7	1	413
A.J. Allmendinger	82.8	8.0	11.0	14.0	12.7	-1	10	11	413
Brandon Jones	81.4	21.0	6.7	18.7	15.3	26	5	4	354
Justin Allgaier	80.7	10.3	19.3	24.7	16.7	18	9	7	311
Parker Retzlaff	77.9	18.0	18.7	12.7	16.3	8	6	0	402
Ryan Sieg	74.2	25.0	7.7	20.3	12.7	-19	16	19	411
Jeb Burton	74.1	25.3	13.3	19.3	17.0	61	6	8	409
Jeremy Clements	68.3	17.3	20.3	23.3	22.0	33	9	0	343
Sam Mayer	64.4	12.0	21.7	27.7	23.0	-1	19	0	256
Jeffrey Earnhardt	62.4	28.0	25.0	22.5	22.0	-13	9	0	215
Brennan Poole	58.8	30.0	25.3	14.7	23.3	-21	6	0	411
Blaine Perkins	57.1	29.3	21.0	22.3	21.0	-12	3	0	409
Leland Honeyman	56.7	30.7	25.0	18.3	24.3	-5	6	0	393
Ryan Ellis	50.5	35.7	28.0	20.7	26.0	-22	1	11	410
Kyle Weatherman	50.3	20.7	29.0	27.3	26.0	36	5	0	310
Jordan Anderson	48.4	33.0	18.3	24.3	26.7	9	14	7	329
Kyle Sieg	48.1	25.5	30.0	24.5	27.0	-28	1	1	288
Josh Williams	46.1	15.3	31.3	30.3	28.0	-13	4	0	320
Patrick Emerling	44.5	20.7	22.7	27.3	26.3	-30	5	0	396
Dawson Cram	32.9	31.3	34.0	30.0	30.3	-29	1	0	337

Betting Targets

While I will be steering clear of Austin Hill simply based on his betting odds, he is still clearly the man to beat. Hill has arguably one of the best superspeedway resumes in Xfinity Series history. Therefore while he will not be on our betting card, I would not discourage anyone from throwing Hill into fantasy lineups, H2H match-ups, or even parlay builders. Hill’s teammate Jesse Love has also been very strong at the superspeedways this season and we were able to cash with Love earlier this year at Talladega. Unfortunately, Love is also receiving relatively conservative odds at the 7-1 range which makes him a somewhat dicey option unless his odds improve. With that being said, my focus remains towards the drivers that have sufficient betting value. Based on the metrics above, watching previous races, betting odds, and every other handicapping component imaginable, I would say that the intermediate range of drivers from Sheldon Creed, Riley Herbst, Chandler Smith, and Parker Kligerman have all shown enough consistency and potential to warrant betting consideration.

All of those drivers are getting pretty decent betting odds and have been really strong at this style of racing. Herbst is my favorite from that group and he has shown the best speed in recent weeks with the restrictor plate package. Herbst won at Indianapolis and had the fastest car at Michigan before wrecking out. If you look at those races and the metrics from the superspeedway races earlier this year, I think there is a case for Herbst being among the outright favorites and yet we are getting nearly twice the value. Needless to say, Herbst will be in my lineup for the 3rd straight week. For deeper dark horses and long shots, Parker Retzlaff and Jeb Burton have shown enough consistency to warrant betting consideration especially in prop bet formats. I also have my eye on guys like Sammy Smith, Brandon Jones, and Ryan Sieg as potential dark horses. Unfortunately, that trio is getting slightly better odds than what I consider a true dark horse at less than 25-1 betting odds. However if any of those drivers have poor qualifying efforts and/or their betting odds get better, I think they will instantly become viable betting options.

2024 Wawa 250 Optimal Lineup

2024 Wawa 250 Betting Picks

*FINAL*

Jesse Love +700 (1 unit)
Cole Custer +1400 (.75 unit)
Riley Herbst +1600 (.75 unit)
Parker Kligerman +1800 (.5 unit)
Sam Mayer +2500 (.5 unit)
Brandon Jones +2500 (.5 unit)
Parker Retzlaff +5000 (.25 unit)

H2H Match-Ups and Props

Brennan Poole +1600 finishes Top 5 (.5 unit)
Caesar Bacarella +2000 finishes Top 5 (.5 unit)

Two Team Parlays

Jesse Love +150 over Austin Hill
Toyota +240 wins Coke Zero Sugar 400
Risking 1 unit to win: +750