Food City 500 Preview and Picks
NASCAR Sprint Cup Race at Bristol
Date and Time: Sunday March 16th, 2014. 1:13PM Eastern
Where: Bristol Motor Speedway Bristol, T.N.
TV: Fox
The final practice for the Food City 500 concluded earlier today giving us our final look at the Sprint Cup field before tomorrow’s race. Casey Mears surprised the garage by laying down the fastest lap in the final session at 125.91mph. Practice speeds in general were a bit all over the map in all 3 sessions this weekend. Practice should never be given too much weight when deciding your picks to win a race and that is definitely the case this weekend in Thunder Valley. However, we did get a good idea of what we can expect tomorrow from today’s Nationwide race.
Kyle Busch took home his 3rd straight Nationwide win at Bristol this afternoon making it his 6th win in his last 8 races at BMS in the series. However the story of the day was not necessarily Kyle Busch. Instead, track position and restarts became the talk around the garage. Track position played a huge part in how the Nationwide race unfolded. With Bristol’s top grove still in force, passing remained extremely difficult allowing leaders to get away fairly often. Only lap traffic and pit stops shook up the lead for most of the afternoon. Additionally, the outside row on restarts can be named the glory lane. Every driver that started on the inside row went backwards on each restart in Saturday’s race and that will definitely be the case again on Sunday.
Obviously those circumstances favor some of the aggressive drivers a bit more this Sunday and strategy may come into play as well. At this point, Brad Keselowski appears to be the car to beat. Keselowski has won 2 of the last 5 races at Bristol and has arguably become the best driver at the half mile bullring. The #2 car had the fastest 10 lap average during Happy Hour and equally impressive with each run in race trim. Brad will start 2nd in tomorrow’s race so track position should be in his favor as well. Additionally the entire Penske organization appears to be really strong at the moment which just makes the case for the #2 team that much stronger.
Speaking of Penske, Brad’s teammate Joey Logano will be worth a look Sunday as well. Logano has not exactly posted great stats at Bristol capturing just one top 5 finish in his 10 career starts. Still, I would not put much weight on past history with the way those Penske cars are running. Logano was 2nd fastest behind Keselowski for 10 lap averages and will start 4th in tomorrow’s race. Outside of Penske racing, most would look towards Joe Gibbs Racing to find a potential winner. Denny Hamlin won the pole for the Food City 500 and won fairly recently at the Bristol night race in 2012. Last year’s Food City 500 winner Matt Kenseth has 3 career wins at Bristol and was solid in all practice session. Kyle Busch’s weekend started off a bit shaky as the #18 team had to move to a backup car after Busch hit the wall in the first practice session. Busch qualified the car in the 7th position despite lacking some speed in practice. However Busch is still the undisputed King of Bristol having won 4 of the last 10 races at Thunder Valley and 5 total in his young career.
For the rest of the field, things are pretty wide open. It will be interesting to see if Dale Earnhardt Jr can keep his hot start to 2014 going. Statistically this is Juniors best track despite the fact the team did not seem happy with the car in practice. Clint Bowyer has been solid all weekend and in recent trip’s to Bristol. Of course it is never fun to lay money on a driver in the midst of a 44 race winless streak, but that does not mean those bets will not ever hit as well. Jeff Gordon and Kurt Busch are two guys that know how to get around Bristol Motor Speedway extremely well. Both drivers have 5 career victories at Bristol and Jeff Gordon has led more laps than any active driver. The bad news is neither driver has won at Bristol since 2006.
Ultimately our picks come down to a variety of factors as it always will with NASCAR. One anomaly to consider for tomorrow is that weather may play a factor in the race as rain is expected for much of the afternoon. If the race is delayed and has to restart later in the day that means that the cars will react completely different than they have all weekend with a green racetrack and possibly cooler temperatures. Of course Bristol has lights meaning the race could be delayed into the late hours if rain indeed plays a factor. Just something to keep in mind.
NASCARWAGERS Picks to win the Food City 500:
Brad Keselowski +850: Our early week pick was Keselowski and his odds have dropped significantly since that time. As mentioned earlier, Keselowski is the man to beat at this point in the game.
Kasey Kahne +950: A driver we have not mentioned much this week is Kasey Kahne but he is a perfect dark horse for this Sunday. Kahne won last year’s Food City 500 and finished 2nd to Matt Kenseth in the Irwin Tools night race in the fall. Team was fast in race trim and running a chassis that finished 3rd at the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis.
Clint Bowyer +2650: At nearly 27-1, Clint Bowyer has a lot of value. Bowyer has the 2nd highest average finish of all drivers over the last 4 races with two top 5’s during that stretch. If there was a time for the #15 team to end their winless streak, this could be it.
Matt Kenseth +825: Our other early week pick from our newsletter. Kenseth won the Irwin Tools night race at Bristol last year and posted the 2nd fastest lap in Happy Hour. Kenseth has posted two top 5’s in the last 4 races and will be searching for his 4th career win at Thunder Valley.
H2H Match-up Kasey Kahne +100 over Jimmie Johnson (2 units)
