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NASCAR Overton's 400 Preview 🏁

This week, the NASCAR Cup series goes out to Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, IL for the Overton's 400. Chicagoland Speedway is a 1.5 mile D-shaped oval similar to Atlanta Motor Speedway, which means speed and tire-wear come into play.  For the last 7 years, NASCAR has visited Chicagoland in September, but this year they moved it up to its original July slot. 

Last week’s winning lineups:

Perfect Lineup: Bowyer, Buescher, Dibenedetto, Harvick, Jones, Truex Jr. 345 DK Pts

$80K Slingshot: Bowyer, Buescher, Dibenedetto, Harvick, Jones, Truex Jr. 345 DK pts. Min cash: 250.75 DK pts.

$30K Happy Hour: Bowyer, Buescher, Dibenedetto, Harvick, Jones, Truex Jr. 345 DK pts. Min cash: 243.75 DK pts.

On to Chicagoland!

Scoring Breakdown

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

Laps Led Points = 0.25 points per lap led. This week 267 laps will be run and 66.75 points will be awarded (unless overtime).

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

Fastest Lap Points = 0.5 points per lap not run under caution (roughly 243 laps are run under the green flag for a total of 121.5 possible 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 🏗️

Chicagoland is an interesting race because the best car finds its way up front eventually, but the dominator doesn't have to start in the top 10 and doesn't always win the race.  Martin Truex Jr. won the last 2 races but did not lead the most laps.  Practice times, especially 10 lap average, will be very important this week.  We will be looking to play lineups with 2 dominators and try to balance out the rest of our team with place differential plays, preferably starting in the top 20-25.

Chicagoland has seen about 6 cars per race finish more than 7 laps down but very few cars fail to finish the race, making it look like there's a low DNF rate, but the out of contention rate is close to 17%.  The stage breakdown is as follows: Stage 1: 80 laps, Stage 2: 80 laps, Stage 3: 107 laps.

There is one other thing to consider: Chicagoland is an impound race, which means once qualifying is over, the cars are locked in a garage and crews are not allowed to make adjustments to them.  Therefore, the cars that qualify will be the cars that are raced.  This will give us a good idea of how fast they are over a single lap, but may not indicate how well they run over long stretches.

*** Special Considerations for This Week ***

As you may have already heard, Martin Truex Jr, Denny Hamlin, Jimmie Johnson and Chris Buescher all failed post qualifying inspection and will start and be scored from the back.  Ricky Stenhouse Jr will also start in the rear of the field but will be scored from 20th because he made unapproved adjustment to the car.  This impacts almost everything because Truex was going to be chalky before the failed inspection and will now become a cash game lock.  Buescher will also become extremely chalky because he literally can't lose any points and, arguably, has a top 20 car.  The interesting decision will be what to do with Hamlin and Johnson.  You could jam all 4 drivers in and be left with $7400 per driver for the other two slots, or you can choose between Hamlin and Johnson and play a stars and scrubs lineup, hoping to nail the top dominator and fill in the rest.  You just about have to play at least three of these drivers in cash, with my preference being Truex>Buescher>Hamlin>Johnson and there will most likely be many lineups that start that way.  In GPPs you could do the same thing if you want to cash and move on, but if you are aiming to win it all, you will have to get creative.  Historically, there has been at least a major and a minor dominator with the major dominator leading at over 100 laps.  These drivers would at least need to finish in the top 10 to replace the second dominator from the perfect lineup, which is attainable for Truex/Hamlin/Johnson.  All of the picks in the remainder of the article should now be seen as GPP recommendations because most lineups should be based around at least 2 of these 4 drivers because it is incredibly unlikely that none of the 4 will find themselves in the perfect lineup.  If you want an incredibly high risk/high reward play, you can try to fade all 4, but that does not have a high probability of success.

Lineup Foundation Targets

Sonoma Review:

• Clint Bowyer (61 DK pts): Sometimes eating chalk works out.  Bowyer had himself a hell of a race, was very highly owned but found himself in the perfect lineup.

• Ryan Newman (10 DK pts): In hindsight he was more of a GPP target.  All three pieces of chalk hit to an extent, so any underachieving driver made this a hard week to cash.

Chicagoland Picks: 

Kyle Larson ($10,400 DK, $11,4000 FD)

Kyle has not won a race yet this year but only has one finish worse than 9th at any 1.5 mile track this year.  His worst finish at Chicagoland is 18th but has 3 top 7's here and ran the third best 10 lap average in the second practice.  Larson is $1000 cheaper on Draftkings than Kyle Busch and starts two places behind him, making him a very viable pivot.

Kevin Harvick ($11,800 DK, $12,300 FD)

It may seem like a cop out to recommend Harvick just about every week, but he has been in a class of his own this year, especially at 1.5 mile tracks.  He has won 3 of the 5 races at intermediate tracks this year (with 2nd and a 40th in the other 2) and has led at least 10 laps in 3 of the last 4 races at Chicagoland. 

Top Tournament Targets

Sonoma Review:

• Denny Hamlin (49 DK pts): Hamlin managed to finished 10th and had a solid race, but was the lowest scoring of the Bowyer/Busch/Hamlin trio and did not find himself in the perfect lineup.

• Kasey Kahne (29.75 DK pts): Tried to play the pit strategy game and picked up 11 laps led and 6 place differential.  Overall solid day and got the best he could out of his car.

• Kurt Busch (55.75 DK pts): Very highly owned and he paid off.  He wasn't in any winning lineup, but pairing him with Bowyer or Hamlin was a nice way to start off your day.

Chicagoland Picks:

Ryan Blaney  ($8,300 DK , $10,500 FD)

Paul Menard qualified on the pole, but I don't expect him to stay up front very long.  The big name drivers with the good, long run cars start a little further back than they are used to, leaving the opening section of the race looking for a dominator.  I was having a tough time debating between Blaney and Elliott as my early race dominator, but gave Blaney the edge because; 1. He had the better single lap time in both first and second practice, 2. he's slightly cheaper, and 3. he's running in a Ford (which has been the best manufacturer so far this year).  Both Elliott and Blaney have run well here (with Elliott having the better track history) but this year, in races where both drivers finished the race, Blaney has performed better.  It is a difficult decision and both drivers carry some risk, but I believe the key to unlocking a GPP may be nailing the early dominator. 

Bubba Wallace ($6,200 DK , $7,000 FD)

Wallace has no track history to speak of but we may be able to use that to our advantage. He is higher priced than the two chalkier drivers starting next to him (Bayne and Ragan) but seems to have the best car of the three. He has run respectably well this year at 1.5 mile tracks, with high finishes of 8 and 16, and only needs a top 16 to reach 5x his salary.

Jaime McMurray ($8,100 DK , $9,100 FD)

McMurray is another driver that may find himself going under-owned due to his price. He has single lap and 10 lap speeds much better than what he qualified and, in the last 4 races at Chicagoland, has finished between 9-16.  He has two top 6 finishes in the last 3 races at 1.5 mile tracks but needs a top 8 to pay off his salary.

Bargain Bin

Sonoma review:

• Cole Whitt  (6 DK points): Whitt was only able to run 57 laps and was the lowest scoring driver $5300 and below.

• Parker Kligerman (32 DK points):  While he didn't find himself in the winning lineup, Kligerman finished 23rd and was the highest scoring driver under $5000 by 12 points.

Chicagoland Picks

Sub $5,500- Landon Cassill ($5,200 DK, $5,500 FD)

I think this is another week where we would, ideally, try to avoid dipping down into this range due to the driver's limited ceiling, but I believe Cassill may be the highest scoring in this range.  His practice times are poor, but has positive place differential in each of the last 5 races here with high finish of 20 and a low finish of 29, and he also hasn't finished worse than 28th in any 1.5 mile track this year.

Sub $5,000 Corey LaJoie ($4,900 DK, $5,000 FD)

I really can't get too excited about this range, but for only $400 more than min a salary ,at least Lajoie has a car faster than two or three cars ahead of him.

Other Drivers To Consider

Michigan Recap

• Kevin Harvick (75.75 DK pts): Highest scoring driver of the week, didn't win the race but paid off his salary easily and was in the perfect lineup.

• Kyle Busch (44.5 DK pts):  While 44.5 DK points isn't terrible, it didn't pay off his salary and he was outscored by the chalk.

• Ty Dillon (9 DK pts): Ty couldnt get out of his own way...or the 30s.

Here are 2 more drivers I like at Chicagoland that have a chance to make some noise, in no particular order:

Alex Bowman  ($7,700 DK, $8,100 FD)

Ty Dillon  ($5,600 DK, $6,500 FD)

Top Driver to Avoid

Sonoma Recap:

• Jaime McMurray. (-26 DK pts): Only three drivers went negative at Sonoma and even though McMurray may not have been as high owned as Allmendinger, having him in your lineups would have been an absolute disaster.

Chicagoland Pick

Paul Menard ($7,000 DK, $8,700 FD)

Menard winning the pole may be a feel good story, but in reality, I can't see him leading for very long, and he needs to hold onto a top 5 for 5x.  If he puts up more than 40 points, I will be downright shocked.

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

Be sure to download the Overton's 400 Cheatsheet!

Follow me on Twitter @joejets19 and let me know if you have any questions about the cheatsheet.