On Sunday, NASCAR’s Cup Series will wave the green flag for the Shriners Children’s 500 at Phoenix Raceway for the 4th race of the season. So far, William Byron (Daytona) and Christopher Bell (Atlanta/COTA) are the only drivers that have scored wins this season and Bell will have the opportunity to seek a rare 3rd consecutive victory which has only been accomplished by 17 drivers in NASCAR history. More importantly, Sunday’s return to Phoenix will be important for drivers/teams that are trying to assess their speed at the venue that continues to decide the championship every fall. Team Penske has clearly had the edge in recent years and their performance at Phoenix has helped capture the last 3 Cup Series Championships. Needless to say, this is a very important race for finding speed that can potentially have championship consequences when the series returns in November.
Last November, Joey Logano earned his 3rd Cup Series title with a win in the series finale at Phoenix. Logano was able to hold off teammate Ryan Blaney to give Roger Penske his 3rd straight Cup Series Championship. Earlier today, Joey Logano appeared poised to win the pole for Sunday’s Shriners Children’s 500 but was edged out by William Byron who was the final car on track in qualifying. As a result, Byron won the Busch Pole Award with a fast lap of 133.680mph. Personally, Byron was a guy that has been on my radar throughout the weekend due to his performance at Phoenix over the last few years therefore I was not surprised with his pole winning effort. However, there were some surprise stories towards the top of the charts which included the likes of Carson Hocevar, Josh Berry, and Erik Jones who all qualified in the top 5 positions.
For bettors, I would iterate the fact that starting positions do not have a strong correlation to finishing position at Phoenix. While the early track position is advantageous, there are 500 laps of action slated for Sunday that will be full of twists and turns. Last year, Christopher Bell won the spring race at Phoenix from the 13th starting position and we have seen previous races at Phoenix produce winners from a wide array of starting positions. Needless to say, we should expect to see some “comer and goers” on Sunday especially when you consider the fact that track conditions will be much different from Saturday’s practice and qualifying session. Our focus from a betting standpoint is to identify the drivers that should contend for the victory or have much higher ceilings than current betting odds suggest in order to potentially extract H2H/prop bet value.
When it comes to handicapping Phoenix, I like to observe track history at Phoenix and I will also even extend performance trends to tracks like Richmond and Iowa which have a lot of similarities. However, Phoenix is one of those venues where equipment/handling can be an equally important handicapping angle. The Cup Series cars are so evenly manufactured in today’s racing, the setup/chassis at venues like Phoenix can be a big part of the success criteria. As a result, I believe practice speeds do often somewhat indicate what drivers may have hit or missed the setup going into the weekend. Therefore, we will discuss practice speeds down below to be considered as another handicapping angle this week.
From a betting perspective, I believe this race is slightly top heavy going into Sunday. What I mean by that statement is that I believe the top 4-5 betting favorites have a high likelihood of cashing as a winner of the Shriners Children’s 500 which limits value in futures formats. While we will still take a few stabs at futures bets despite the limited ROI, I still expect the best sharp value to come from H2H match-ups on Sunday. If we can avoid the bad luck that we experienced in Saturday’s Xfinity Series race, this should be the best path to turning a profitable betting card!
| Driver | Average Driver Rating (Next Gen at Phoenix) |
|---|---|
| Ryan Blaney | 115.4 |
| William Byron | 110.6 |
| Kyle Larson | 101.6 |
| Christopher Bell | 98.1 |
| Ross Chastain | 97.2 |
| Joey Logano | 95 |
| Tyler Reddick | 94.8 |
| Denny Hamlin | 92.2 |
| Chase Elliott | 89.3 |
| Chase Briscoe | 86.3 |
| Chris Buescher | 83.3 |
| Daniel Suarez | 73.4 |
| Kyle Busch | 73.4 |
| Brad Keselowski | 72.8 |
| Bubba Wallace | 72.4 |
| Alex Bowman | 71.2 |
| Carson Hocevar | 70.4 |
| Noah Gragson | 69.4 |
| Cole Custer | 68 |
| Ty Gibbs | 65.4 |
| Erik Jones | 64.3 |
| Ryan Preece | 63.1 |
| Michael McDowell | 60.1 |
| Austin Cindric | 56.3 |
| Josh Berry | 56.1 |
| John Hunter Nemechek | 55.9 |
| Austin Dillon | 55.7 |
| A.J. Allmendinger | 54.7 |
| Todd Gilliland | 46.5 |
| Ricky Stenhouse Jr. | 46.1 |
| Justin Haley | 45.3 |
| Ty Dillon | 41.5 |
| Zane Smith | 39.2 |
The biggest winner on Saturday was Carson Hocevar in the #77 car. Hocevar posted the fastest lap in practice with a speed of 132.533mph and then backed it up with a 3rd place qualifying effort that I mentioned above. While Hocevar has never shown winning speed at Phoenix, this is by far the best the young driver has ever looked through 3 career prior starts. While some may perceive Hocevar’s speed shown on Saturday as a fluke, teammate Michael McDowell was also surprisingly fast and among the top cars in nearly all metrics. Therefore, the Spire Motorsports cars appear to be among the team that have hit on something going into the weekend.
Behind the surprise stories from Hocevar and McDowell, I thought the usual suspects were among the top drivers in practice which included the likes of William Byron, Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, and Kyle Larson. Those 4 drivers have the best handicapping metrics for Phoenix and should be expected favorites. Other drivers that showed solid speed included the likes of Tyler Reddick, Austin Cindric, and Zane Smith among the most notable drivers that appeared to stand out from opening betting odds. Meanwhile, drivers that appeared to be further down the speed charts than most would have expected include the likes of Denny Hamlin, Chase Elliott, and Chase Briscoe.
In terms of the outright victory, I believe strong arguments can be made for all of the top 6 betting favorites in Bell, Blaney, Byron, Reddick, Larson, and Logano. Honestly, I think odds makers have handicapped this race pretty well as I agree with the majority of the top favorites and how they are ranked in terms of odds. With that being said, I believe Joey Logano and Kyle Larson have the best value to warrant betting consideration among the favorites. Both drivers are in the top 4 categories in nearly every handicapping metrick but are getting nearly twice the value of guys like Blaney, Byron, and Bell. If I had to choose a favorite from the top 3, Ryan Blaney would get the nod based on his incredible performance history that has been long overdue for a victory.
While I personally don’t believe a dark horse will win on Sunday, we have to consider dark horses more often with this Next Gen Car because these cars are so close on lap times which lends the possibility for late race strategy deciding the outcome and potentially producing an upset winner. Drivers that appear to fall within that category include the likes of Ross Chastain and Austin Cindric as drivers that could race much closer to the front than current odds makers suggest and be worthy of consideration in all formats. Chastain has been an underrated Phoenix talent despite being a former winner (2023).
Meanwhile, Cindric has performed much better than most metrics indicate because the team had two early DNFs in 2 of the last 3 races. However, I think Cindric has shown solid speed alongside his Team Penske teammates at Phoenix and is being disrespected from an odds perspective. Lastly, I would list drivers like Chris Buescher and Chris Buescher as drivers that could yield low-risk/high-reward value in prop bet formats. Strictly for fantasy purposes, Alex Bowman, Chase Briscoe, and Daniel Suarez are some additional names worth mentioning that should move forward from disappointing qualifying positions and turn solid value in fantasy formats.
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