The NASCAR Cup Series will take the green flag for their 68th season Sunday at the Daytona 500 and I cannot wait. NASCAR decided to bring back the same format for the Fantasy Live game in 2026. This has been my best game for years and as far as I know, this website is the only one to give you in-race help with your Garage pick. I will do the same in 2026.
The Fantasy Live picks have outscored 99% of the entries in both the regular season and playoffs games for 13of the last 14 seasons. Last year was the only year they failed to reach that mark. I learned my lesson though. Practice speed did not translate into race speed in 2025 and that was my flaw. I often set my lineups based on practice speeds. I will still use some practice speed in 2026, but I am not setting my lineups only on what happens on the track in practice.
STRATEGY FOR DAYTONA
Why have my picks been so successful? Too many people get caught up in saving allocations with their drivers. Yes, we can only use a driver 10 times during the regular season (26 races). That means we need to use 130 allocations (5 Drivers per Week) for our teams. We should use drivers like Shane Van Gisbergen, AJ Allmendinger, Chris Buescher, Connor Zilisch and Michael McDowell at the four road course races and we use drivers like Bubba Wallace, Austin Cindric and Chris Buescher at the six Superspeedways (Daytona, Atlanta and Talladega). That means we only need 98 allocations for our lineups. We ONLY need 10 drivers to make it through the season. It really is not that difficult. I plan to use 1. Kyle Larson, 2. William Byron, 3. Denny Hamlin, 4. Christopher Bell, 5. Ryan Blaney, 6. Chase Briscoe, 7. Chase Elliott, 8. Tyler Reddick, 9. Joey Logano and 10. Chris Buescher as my 10 drivers to get me through the season. Add in some starts with Alex Bowman, Ross Chastain, Ty Gibbs and Brad Keselowski and I will not even use up all of the allocations with the drivers I have in my list of 10 drivers. So, do not worry about allocations on the non-Superspeedway and non-road course tracks. They are not as important as you think in the Fantasy Live game.
Here are the picks for the Daytona 500…
KYLE BUSCH (10): Busch was awesome on the narrow drafting tracks in 2024. He finished 12th in the Daytona 500, 3rd at Atlanta (Photo-Finish), 2nd in the Coke Zero 400 at Daytona and 7th in the second race at Atlanta. Can he find that same magic this weekend? Busch has one of the fastest cars in the field. He really did not race hard Thursday night, so we do not know exactly how good the No. 8 car is. Busch should score some place differential points and finish up front Sunday.
CHASE BRISCOE (10): Briscoe looked like he could have led every lap in his Duel Race Thursday night if he wanted too. His stats at Daytona are not great, but he is a new driver ever since he joined Joe Gibbs Racing. Briscoe won the last race on a drafting track (Talladega in the playoffs). I mapped out my allocations with Briscoe and I had two left. I am sure everyone will save Briscoe for the more predictable tracks; I will be different and use him this week. Allocations just are not as important as people think they are.
ALEX BOWMAN (10): Bowman has scored the most Fantasy Live Points in the Daytona 500 during the Gen-7 car era. Bowman finished 6th in the Daytona 500 last year, 2nd in 2024 and 5th in 2023. William Byron gets all of the hype from the Hendrick Motorsports Garage when it comes to the Daytona 500, but Bowman is usually the driver pushing Byron at the end of those races. The Daytona 500 is a good race to use an allocation with the No. 48 car.
MICHAEL MCDOWELL (10): I really like what I saw from McDowell Thursday night. He led the Cup Series with 144 Quality Passes in the race. The No. 71 car was one of the few who could go from the back to the front without much help. That is exactly what we are looking for in a driver at Daytona. McDowell won the Daytona 500 in 2021. His car is one of the best handling cars in the field, so I will take a chance with McDowell Sunday.
JOHN H. NEMECHEK (10): I doubt many people in your league will have the guts to play Nemechek Sunday. Sometimes, you just need to cover the name on the windshield and look at the results on the track. Nemecheck has competed in 6 races at Daytona in the Cup Series and he has finished on the lead lap in all of them. His 11th-place average finishing position in the Gen-7 car at Daytona is second-best to Chris Buescher. The worst Nemechek ever finished at this track is 17th. He has a high floor and a high ceiling this week, so I will use an allocation with Nemechek to save my top drivers for the more predictable races.
(GARAGE PICK) CHRIS BUESCHER (10): I had Buescher locked into my lineup until he wrecked in the Duel Race Thursday. He has the best average finishing position in the last 8 races at Daytona (Gen-7 car era). Buescher has an average finishing position of 8th in the last 6 races at Daytona. That includes a trip to Victory Lane in 2023. Buescher is either really lucky or he is really good at Daytona. There is some risk in using Buescher since he starts dead last so I will start him in the Garage. I would not be surprised if Buescher ends up in my starting lineup Sunday.
Good luck and be sure to follow me on X (Twitter) @MrFantasyNASCAR. I will send out a Tweet during the race to let you know if I plan to swap out one of my drivers for my Garage pick.