The NASCAR Cup Series will join the Xfinity Series at Talladega this weekend. The 2024 season has been dominated by Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing. The drivers from those two teams have won eight of the nine races this year. Sunday’s race at Talladega is very important for the other teams. They know that winning at Talladega is their best chance of securing a sport in the playoffs. The first two Superspeedways races (Daytona and Atlanta) have had exciting finishes. I expect the same at Talladega.
TALLADEGA SCHEDULE
The trip to Talladega means that the Cup Series and Xfinity Series will NOT have practice this weekend. The cars will line up for single car qualifying to set the field for their races. It would be nice if NASCAR gave the teams a 10-minute practice to ensure their cars do not have any mechanical issues, but the teams do not want to jeopardize crashing their cars. The elimination of practice prevents the teams from having to bring a backup car to the track.
Here is the schedule for the races at Talladega…
FANTASY PREVIEW FOR TALLADEGA
Predicting the finishing order at Talladega is impossible. Selecting a fantasty team for the race is pretty easy. We need to give the drivers from Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing the week off in our season-long leagues (Fantasy Live and the Driver Group Game). Their allocations are more valuable at the races that are easier to predict. We need to focus our picks on the drivers who have consistently finished the races on the Superspeedways in the Gen-7 car. This is the week to take a chance with Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Brad Keselowski, Austin Cindric, Chris Buescher, Bubba Wallace, Michael McDowell, Daniel Suarez, Erik Jones or Kyle Busch.
Selecting a DFS lineup is not tough at Talladega. The dominator points do not matter (points for leading laps and scoring fastest laps). We need to focus our picks on the drivers who can score the most place differential points. You can almost hide the names and simply select a lineup based on the drivers starting position and score well Sunday. I will be playing a lot of drivers who start outside the top-25 in my DFS lineups at Talladega.
FANTASY STATS FOR TALLADEGA
The races at Talladega are unpredictable, but there are a few drivers who are better at Superspeedway racing then others. We will give our Fantasy NASCAR lineups the best chance of scoring well Sunday by sticking to the drivers who consistently finish the races on the Superspeedway. We can find these drivers by looking at the data from the four races in the Gen-7 car at Talladega and combining it with the data from the two races on the Superspeedways this year (Daytona and Atlanta).
Here are the stats from the four races at Talladega in the Gen-7 car and the two Superspeedway races this year, sorted by Average Finishing Position…
EARLY WEEK PICKS FOR TALLADEGA
ONE & DONE PICK: JUSTIN HALEY
DRIVER GROUP GAME PICKS: RYAN BLANEY, KYLE BUSCH, JOEY LOGANO, MICHAEL MCDOWELL, AUSTIN CINDRIC, ERIK JONES, COREY LAJOIE, TODD GILLILAND
FANTASY LIVE PICKS: RYAN BLANEY, KYLE BUSCH, BRAD KESELOWSKI, BUBBA WALLACE, ERIK JONES GARAGE: MICHAEL MCDOWELL
* I will update these picks this weekend.
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