Last week, Josh Berry delivered one of the biggest upsets in recent memory on a traditional non-drafting style oval with his victory at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. With the victory, Berry became just the 3rd winner of the season to lock themselves in the playoffs. More importantly with the competition becoming razor thin at NASCAR’s premier level, there are bound to be more surprise stories as the Cup Series’ 2025 campaign continues. On Sunday, the Cup Series will make its annual return to one of the most exciting tracks in the sport at Homestead-Miami Speedway for the running of the Straight Talk Wireless 400 and perhaps another surprise winner awaits!
If you look through the history books at Homestead, the drivers that have visited victory lane have consistently been the best talents in the sport. In fact, the last 5 winners have included highly prestigious names like Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell, Kyle Larson, William Byron, and Denny Hamlin. The reason that trend is so strong is because Homestead has one of the most aged surfaces in the sport. The 1.5 mile speedway has a surface that has never been repaved which produces extreme low-grip conditions and heavy tire wear that rivals tracks like Darlington and Richmond.
The difficult track conditions often produce racing where the top talents in the sport emerge at the front of the field. However, just as Josh Berry proved last week with the Wood Brothers, there are a lot of teams and drivers that have been gaining speed on the top drivers/teams over the last few years. In my personal opinion, this is the tightest the Cup Series has ever been from a competition standpoint from top to bottom. With so many drivers in close proximity, I believe we are going to see a lot of surprise stories this season. If a team can capitalize on pit strategy and get late race track position, there are so many drivers capable of winning and perhaps that deserves more weekly consideration towards bigger betting dark horses!
From a handicapping perspective, bettors should put a lot of focus on track history at Homestead this week and even extend the track history to outside tracks like Darlington. There is a very unique skill set towards making speed at tracks where there is minimal grip and typically we see the same drivers emerge towards the front of the field at these venues. Of course practice speed is not the only handicapping angle to consider this weekend but I would argue it is the most relevant. Bettors should also consider things like performances at 1.5 mile speedways, recent momentum, and practice observations from early Saturday into the overall handicapping equation.
From a betting standpoint, Homestead rarely yields valuable outright winners. Due to the fact the top talents always seem to emerge at the front of the field, heavy betting favorites are usually the ones that are in victory lane at Homestead. For that reason, I have always made my bread and butter in the form of H2H formats at tracks like Homestead and Darlington. Bettors should be able to identify sharp value in match-up situations and that is where I believe the best value will be again on Sunday. A rule of thumb that always applies at these difficult tracks is that our betting selections should always be the most talented driver over the less talented driver despite; at least most talented at this style of racing regardless what practice or qualifying results may indicate!
Alex Bowman was the driver that stood on top of the charts following qualifying on Saturday. Bowman posted a fast lap of 168.485mph to earn his 1st pole ever at Homestead and just the 6th pole of his career. Bowman is one of those drivers that has been trending in the right direction so far this season and he will be joined by last week’s winner Josh Berry on the front row for Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400. From a handicapping perspective, I rarely yield much weight towards qualifying results at Homestead because long-run speed is key. Before qualifying, practice observations may have given our first glimpse at long-run speed this weekend.
During practice, I thought Kyle Larson was once again the class of the field. Larson led most major consecutive lap average categories with a notable mention going to Bubba Wallace who had the best fire off speed in the 5-10 lap average categories. Ultimately, Larson, William Byron, Ryan Blaney, and Tyler Reddick were all among the fastest guys in practice which is no surprise based on the details already discussed above. If I had to call out any surprise stories, I would point to the likes of Ross Chastain, Kyle Busch, and Joey Logano among the group of drivers that did not seem to have the speed most would have expected. Meanwhile, Carson Hocevar and Noah Gragson were among the less popular names that appeared to be trending in the right direction with respectable speed.
Before odds even posted this week, I thought statistically Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, Tyler Reddick, and William Byron were in a league of their own in terms of past performance at Homestead. Ironically, that is the exact order of favorites going into Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400. Based on practices, track history, and even speed shown thus far this year, Larson clearly gets the nod as the outright favorite. Personally, I am downgrading Reddick slightly due to Toyotas struggles at Las Vegas and they appeared to have some struggles again in practice today. Reddick is a sensational talent at Homestead but I am just avoiding the low number. Blaney and Byron are perhaps the better favorites to target from a value standpoint. However, I think odds’ makers have nailed it on the head with having Larson and Blaney as the heavy favorites because I believe those are specifically the two drivers with the most realistic chance to win on Sunday.
With that being said, we saw last week that anything can happen at the end of these races and rest assured strategy will be in play throughout 400 miles of racing on Sunday. Based on current betting odds, Denny Hamlin is among those that deserves strong consideration. Hamlin has the most wins among active drivers and is getting relatively decent value following a poor qualifying effort. Behind Hamlin, Alex Bowman and Josh Berry appear to be live dark horses for the outright win as well. I know we are a week late on Berry’s chances after last week’s surprise victory at Las Vegas but we should also give credit for the speed Berry has shown all season in the #21 car for the Wood Brothers. Personally, I like Bowman and Berry more in H2H formats but both drivers can be considered in all formats as well.
Lastly, I am going to likely throw out a few prop bets for this race simply because I’m sure strategy will cause some surprises. More importantly, there are some drivers that are getting monstrous betting odds that actually run pretty well at Homestead. Among drivers in that category include the likes of Austin Dillon, Ryan Preece, and AJ Allmendinger. All of those drivers have posted solid finishes in recent races at Homestead and have normally overcome poor qualifying positions in each of those races. As a result, I believe that trio can be targeted in low-risk/high-reward prop bets and the duo of Preece/Dillon are among some of my favorite low-tier fantasy targets as well!
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