2025 The LiUNA Race Picks

Date/Time: Saturday March 15th, 2025. 4:30PM (EST)
Where: Las Vegas Motor Speedway
TV: CW

Last week, the Xfinity Series delivered one of the best finishes of the season between Alex Bowman and Aric Almirola in a wild and chaotic late race restart. On Saturday, the Xfinity Series returns for potentially more exciting racing with the running of The LiUNA at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Through 4 races this season, the Xfinity Series has produced 4 different winners and I believe that number will continue to grow significantly throughout the year due to the loaded talent throughout the field. The good news for bettors is that this series should continue to provide betting value as we move forward on a week to week basis.

As I stated in our Truck Series preview, we must approach these races this weekend at Las Vegas in conservative fashion. Tomorrow’s race will be the first Xfinity Series race of the season on an intermediate 1.5 mile layout and that means we have yet to see the teams/drivers that have either found or lost speed over the offseason. While historical data and averages can give us some baseline expectations, we don’t have enough in-season data to feel completely confident that we know everything. I expect there to be some surprises each week in this series with teams either hitting or missing the setup. As a result, practice observations may hold heavier weight into the handicapping equation especially when trying to identify value in H2H match-ups.

Luckily, the Xfinity Series participated in practice and qualifying sessions late Friday afternoon which should give us some insight into what we may expect on Saturday. At the end of both sessions, Sammy Smith emerged with the pole award following a fast lap of 183.455mph. Smith was joined by J.R. Motorsports rookie teammates Carson Kvapil and Connor Zilisch as the top 3 qualifiers while teammate Justin Allgaier qualified in the 6th position. Needless to say, J.R. Motorsports appears to have the upper-hand going into Saturday and it will be interesting to see how things unfold during race conditions. With that being said, qualifying speed does not always correlate with race speed and “handling” will be a much bigger focus under green flag conditions!

Las Vegas – Xfinity Series Betting Notes

• Austin Hill is the only former Las Vegas winner in the field. Hill’s victory came in the spring race in 2023.
• Despite not having any wins at Las Vegas, Justin Allgaier has produced +100 driver ratings in his last 7 starts and has finished in the top 5 in 5 of the last 7 starts as well.
• Connor Zilisch (fastest in practice) finished 4th in his only career start at a 1.5 mile speedway (Kansas) last year.
• Ryan Sieg posted two-runner up finishes and finished 7th or better in 4 of the last 5 races last year at 1.5 mile speedways.
• Sammy Smith has finished 17th or worse in 3 of 4 starts at Las Vegas.
• Sheldon Creed’s best finish is 7th in 6 career starts at Las Vegas.
• Chevrolet teams have won 5 of the last 8 races at Las Vegas.
• The eventual race winner has started worse than 7th in the last 8 straight races at Las Vegas.
• There have been 5 cautions or less in 5 of the last 6 races at Las Vegas.

Practice Observations

Prior to qualifying, Xfinity Series teams were split into two practice groups. In the opening session, Sheldon Creed posted the fastest lap over Austin Hill and Carson Kvapil. Creed was probably the 2nd best car in race conditions behind Austin Hill who led most lap average categories. However, the 2nd practice session appeared to have the most heavy hitters. In fact, the 2nd practice group produced 9 of the 11 fastest laps of the afternoon. Connor Zilisch had fast lap honors with a speed of 178.412mph. Zilisch and teammate Justin Allgaier appeared to show the best speed in the 2nd session. Meanwhile, I would mention names like Sammy Smith, Aric Almirola, and Jeb Burton as drivers that also showed pretty solid speed on the stopwatch. Meanwhile, drivers like Brandon Jones, Harrison Burton, and Jesse Love were among the group of drivers that appeared to be trending in the wrong direction and further down the speed charts than most would have expected.

Betting Targets

Personally, I did not believe Aric Almirola flexed enough speed to be tied with Justin Allgaier as the outright betting favorite. Meanwhile, the J.R. Motorsports cars all looked strong and Allgaier has a very strong resume at Las Vegas despite being winless. As a result of those factors combined with the fact Allgaier let one slip away last week, I think Allgaier has to be the top rated driver going into Saturday’s green flag. Behind the Allgaier/Almirola duo, things really get interesting with the betting odds. Zilisch has appeared to have one of the best cars but there is not much value in his current odds. Meanwhile, drivers like Austin Hill, Sheldon Creed, and Sammy Smith are drivers listed with decent betting odds that have legitimate winning upside!

While I personally do not favor any deep dark horses, I would say that William Sawalich and Jeb Burton have potential to yield much higher ceilings than current betting odds suggest. For that reason, I believe Sawalich and Burton are most favorable in low-risk/high-reward style prop bets. In terms of H2H targets for match-ups, Austin Hill, Sheldon Creed, and Sawalich appear poised to outrun their betting odds. The only downside is Creed rarely gets the finishes to match the speed he produces. As a result, I would not blame anyone for avoiding Creed all together. In terms of fantasy racing targets, Creed, Christian Eckes, and Dean Thompson are among my favorite betting targets that should overcome poor qualifying efforts on Friday.

Draftkings The LiUNA Optimal Fantasy Lineup

2025 The LiUNA Betting Picks

*FINAL*

Sammy Smith +1000 (1 unit)
Austin Hill +1100 (.75 unit)
Sheldon Creed +1200 (.75 unit)

H2H Match-Ups and Props

Taylor Gray -130 over Ryan Sieg (2 units)
Justin Allgaier -110 over Aric Almirola (2 units)
Christian Eckes over Nick Sanchez (2 units) *early pick
Sammy Smith +250 wins Group B (Jones, Kvapil, Sieg)(1 unit)

Two Team Parlay

Justin Allgaier +300 wins The LiUNA
Bubba Wallace +225 wins Group D (Gibbs, Keselowski, Suarez)
Risking 1 unit to win: +1180 *early pick