Written by @joejets19

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Goodyear 400 🏁

I want to start off this week's Pitstop with a wholehearted Happy Mother's Day to the singular mother (if even) reading. It's fitting that NASCAR is racing the Lady in Black on Mother's Day this year, make sure to set your lineups Saturday night so you avoid getting a black eye on Sunday. Enough of the terrible jokes, the Goodyear 400 will be run at Darlington Raceway in Darlington, SC this weekend. The track is a 1.366 mile banked, egg-shaped oval. It is a unique track shape, with turns one and two forming a wider end than turns three and four and the abrasive surface just eats away at tires. They will be running a different rules package this year at Darlington- 750 HP and a small spoiler. All three races last year featured the 550 HP engine, so those results may not be as useful as they seem. As for the weather, 0% chance of rain at the current moment.

On to Kansas!

Scoring Breakdown

At this point, we know how the DK scoring system works, so let's see how many points are available this week:

Laps Led Points =0.25 points per lap led. This week, 293 laps will be run this and 73.25 DK points will be awarded (plus any overtime laps).

Place Differential Points = 1 point per position gained or -1 point per position lost.

Fastest Lap Points = 0.45 points per lap not run under caution (roughly 253 laps should run under the green flag for a total of 113.85 possible DK points).

Finishing Position Points: The 40th place driver receives 4 points, and for each position gained, another point is awarded (39th=5, 38th=6…) and the winner gets 46 points.

Lineup Construction 🏁

Darlington is a creature all to itself. It's quirky shape and banked corners dare drivers to race the high line and flirt with the wall for nearly 300 laps while it's unforgiving racing surface wear away at the tires with every lap. While there is seldom a massive wreck like we see at superspeedways cautions can come early and often, three of the last seven races had at least 10 cautions. This will not affect our overall approach but should be taken into account for risk management purposes. Like most races, we want to start our lineup construction with our dominators. Six of the last seven races have seen at least one driver lead at least 100 laps. In that time there were: two races that only had one dominator who led 200+ laps, one races where two drivers led more than 100 laps, two races where three drivers led between 76-124 laps (and all appeared in the perfect lineup) and one race where there was a major and minor dominator. Dominators can come from just about anywhere in the field, but both drivers who led more than 200 laps started on the pole. For this race I think we are going to focus on a two dominator build, with two drivers starting in the top 10, and if one of our place differential drivers makes their way up front then that is a bonus.

An interesting theme in the perfect lineups for the '16, '17 and '18 races (with the most comparable rules package), is that they all had four drivers starting in the top 20 and two drivers starting 28th or worse. As I mentioned earlier, Darlington is not the easiest track to navigate so that is an incredibly risky lineup construction that I would not suggest for cash. In cash games I think two dominators, one punt and three place differential drivers is the way to attack this race but if you want a shot to take down a big GPP we may want to front load our lineups a bit.

Stage 1: 90 laps, Stage 2: 95 laps, Stage 3: 108 laps

Competition Caution: Lap 30

Lineup Foundation Targets

Kyle Larson ($11,400 DK, $13,000 FD)

I know this is a repeat pick but I am a sucker for a good narrative. Larson ran away with last week's race until a questionable caution was thrown and things spiraled from there. I think he shows up on Sunday with a chip on his shoulder and the determination to not let anyone deny him a trip to victory lane. Larson starts 14th on Sunday and comes in as the highest priced driver on DK but only the third most expensive on FD. He did not race here at all last season but does have a fantastic track history with three top 3 finishes in his last four including races with 124 and 284 laps led. He will need to get upfront to pay off his high price tag but I love his chances to land in the perfect lineup.

Ryan Preece ($5,900 DK, $4,500 FD)

I am going to admit this is more of a gut play than anything this weekend but the combination of Preece's price and starting position (29th) is really drawing me to him. He has three top 22 finishes in his four races here and an average finish of 19.33 in his three races he didn't have car troubles. Preece can serve the role as our one low priced driver in our cash build or as one of the two drivers starting 28th or worse in our GPP build. A top 20 finish would go a long way to landing Preece in the perfect lineup.

Tournament Targets

Kevin Harvick ($9,600 DK, $10,500 FD)

Harvick has not been his usual self this season but this is the perfect get-right spot for him. He is starting 2nd on Sunday, right next to Brad Keselowski, and is in a prime position to be a major dominator. In 2016 he led 214 laps from the pole, running the similar rules package, and has a chance to go a bit overlooked considering Kes, Kyle Busch, and Truex Jr (the three other drivers starting in the top 4) have won three of the last four races this season. There is no shortage of potential dominators for this race but I think Harvick has a solid chance to muddy up the playoff picture even more with a dominant performance and possibly even a win.

Kurt Busch ($8,400 DK, $8,500 FD)

Kurt is a great gpp option on Sunday. He is starting 17th and has almost zero dominator potential but he has a great track history with an average finish of 7.8 in his last five races here, including an average positive place differential of 6 spots in that time. He is another driver that has started off slow by his standards but provides significant upside at a discount if he just runs an average race.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. ($7,600 DK, $5,500 FD)

I smile to myself every time I have a reason to write up Stenhouse as my risky play of the week. I will never forget how high I was on him going into the first race back from Covid last season when he forgot to turn his wheel and crashed into the wall on the very first lap. That "anything can happen" feeling is what Stenhouse brings to the table every week. In his last five races at Darlington, Stenhouse has finishes ranging from 12 to 40th, and considering he is starting 28th on Sunday, that is ok. Stenhouse is by no means a cash game option but a top 15 would put him in serious contention of a spot in the perfect lineup and that is well within the range of outcomes.

Bargain Basement

JJ Yeley ($4,800 DK, $2,000 FD)

Yeley is not a driver I ever go out of my way to roster but he is so incredibly cheap that he makes getting to Larson a little easier. I don't think there is any chance Yeley makes it into the perfect lineup because his ceiling is about a 28th place finish but with a starting position of 34th, he can easily post a respectable enough score to make him useful in cash.

Other Drivers To Consider

Here are 3 more drivers I like at Darlington that have a chance to make some noise in no particular order:

Christopher Bell ($8,600 DK, $9,000 FD)

Austin Dillon ($7,500 DK, $7,800 FD)

Erik Jones ($8,200 DK, $7,300 FD)

Top Driver to Avoid

Joey Logano ($11,100 DK, $10,000 FD)

Logano is incredibly expensive this weekend and is starting 11th, a spot where I don't think he can pay off his salary by domination or place differential. In his entire career at Darlington, Logano has never led more than 37 laps in a single race. He also only has 6 top 10 finishes in 14 career races here.

Thanks for reading and good luck this weekend! Be sure to join me in the LineStar NASCAR chat! 

Be sure to download the Goodyear 400 Cheatsheet and find me on Twitter Good Luck!

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