Trackhouse Racing’s PROJECT91 unveiled the sharp paint scheme that Kimi Räikkönen will pilot around Watkins Glen International in his NASCAR Cup Series debut this weekend.
Räikkönen, the 2007 Formula One World Champion and 21-race winner, returns to NASCAR behind the wheel of the No. 91 Recogni/iLOQ Chevrolet Camaro ZL1, introducing two new technology companies to the sport. Recogni, headquartered in San Jose, California, focuses on vision-based artificial intelligence, according to the team’s press release, aiming to allow vehicles to “make driving decisions more accurately than humans while consuming minimal amounts of energy.”
iLOQ is a Finnish-based company that has partnered with Räikkönen, a native of Espoo, Finland, since 2019 that centers around digital locking technology.
Räikkönen, who made respective Xfinity and Truck series starts in 2011, returns to stock-car racing in the Go Bowling at The Glen on Sunday (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Kolby Garrison is an avid NASCAR fan. The only thing that separates her from most other fans is that she’s blind.
Kolby has been blind since birth, but became a NASCAR fan as a child when her relatives had the races on the TV and radio.
Now living in Greensboro, North Carolina, she consumes the races each week and has attended several races at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Martinsville Speedway and Richmond Raceway.
“Yes, I experience NASCAR and the world in a different way, but it’s no less rich, no less vivid, no less detailed. Just different,” Garrison says.
NASCAR Studios will explore how Kolby experiences the sounds, smells and textures of NASCAR racing in a four-part, two-week video series coming to YouTube, starting Wednesday.
Bookmark this page to watch weekly updates; Episodes 1 and 2 are now live below.
After 40 years of racing, A.J. Sanders has achieved everything he ever wanted on the race track.
He’s won championships at several different tracks in North and South Carolina. He won a NASCAR national championship in 2014, the first year NASCAR offered national titles for lower divisions. He has 56 race wins in the Q104.1 Stadium Stock Series at Bowman Gray Stadium, a record for the NASCAR-sanctioned quarter-mile track in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and has won multiple most popular driver awards.
“I’ve done everything I possibly can do in local racing like this that a person could dream of doing,” Sanders said.
All those achievements, though, aren’t stopping the 54-year-old this season. Sanders has seven wins and 15 top-five finishes in 16 races between Bowman Gray, Florence Motor Speedway and Wake County Speedway, and he’s currently fourth in the NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series Division IV national points standings.
There’s no question: Sanders would like to add another national title to his resume.
“This year, we’re trying for it,” he said. “I don’t know if we’re going to get enough races to be able to do it. Hopefully we can maybe get into the top three. I’d love to win it, but hopefully we get into the top three in the national and win the regional and be able to go to the banquet.”
Sanders started racing when he was 13. His dad was also a long-time racer, competing until he was 71.
“I’ve had a NASCAR license for a long time, ever since I was able to get them,” Sanders said. “I wanted to do it at 13, and my dad built me a car and said, ‘Here we go.’ We raced against each other.”
Just like how he started racing with his dad, Sanders now goes racing with his own sons. His two oldest both race. His middle son, Stephen also competes in Stadium Stocks at Bowman Gray.
Sanders’ youngest son, Blaze, is his spotter. Blaze is believed to be the youngest regular spotter at Bowman Gray, calling races for his dad despite the fact he’s just 12.
“He’s good,” Sanders said of his youngest son. “That’s all he knows. Since he was a baby, he’s been at the race tracks.
“It’s great because it keeps your family together; it’s kept my whole family together. We know where each other’s at every week, and we’re together, we’re having a good time, and we enjoy it. We get to spend quality time at the track.”
Sanders has seen a lot of changes in racing over the last four decades. He tries to maintain the old school, blue collar way of driving, working on the car and funding everything himself. He’s passed that mentality down to his sons, too.
“I see the young kids nowadays come into the sport, and they don’t work on their cars and they don’t really appreciate what they have like the older racers do,” he said. “They don’t know what it is to struggle. I think a kid should struggle just a little bit to appreciate the wins and championships he gets later.
“You’ve got to be able to work on your car. You need to know what the car is doing when it does something to be able to fix it. You can’t just come in and say, ‘I don’t know, it made a noise,’ or, ‘I don’t know, it’s doing this.’ You need to know how to adjust the car or what to do to it, and the only way you’re going to know that is to have your hand in working on the car. And I think that makes a better racer is the ones who know how to work on their own stuff and come in and make those adjustments.”
It could be that old school mentality that has made Sanders a fan favorite at Bowman Gray. He’s also known for giving away his winners caps and even trophies to young fans after races, and he’ll typically leave his car out after races so others can look at it.
“They’re standing there looking at the car. I say, ‘What are you looking at it for? Get in it!” he said. “And they look at you and their eyes get bigger than their head.”
His biggest joy is passing his love of racing to the next generation.
“When you have kids come to you after the race and say, ‘I really love watching you race,’ or parents come down and say it, I get more out of watching the fans enjoy you. I try to represent myself well for the fans and kids, because that’s the future is the kids.”
With a full-time job as a truck driver, Sanders typically only gets about one day a week to work on his car. He relies on a lot of help from friends and family to be race-ready.
That’s why he works so hard to give back to those who have helped him for so many years, whether that’s those who support him in the pits, at home, or from the stands.
“I’ve always said the driver gets all the glory at the end of the night when he pulls into Victory Lane, but that’s not where it’s at,” he said. “It’s all the people that help you around you… It’s at team effort all the way around.”
Sanders said he may have to step away from his own racing if Blaze gets to the point where he’d like to get behind the wheel. Until then, he’ll be at the track as often as possible, chasing wins and adding more and more achievements to his resume.
“I’ve also put in a lot for this sport in 40 years,” he said. “If you take a man who’s done something 30 or 40 years, he’s sacrificed a lot to be able to do that. That’s where it gets overlooked sometimes… It’s a lot of dedication, a lot of all-nighters to make this work.
“I’ve been very fortunate. I tell people I’m a very lucky man to do what I do and how I do it.”
July 23, 2004 was a memorable day for the Christopher family.
On that summer afternoon at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour teams and drivers competed in the Siemens 100. The day belonged to Ted and Mike Christopher, with the twin brothers combining to lead 80 of the 108 contested laps en route to a one-two finish. Ted won the race, with Mike crossing the finish line second.
Just 5 at the time, Mike Christopher Jr. doesn’t remember much about being at the track that day. He does remember rewatching the race multiple times on VHS, making it one of his earliest memories of Modified racing.
“That was just an incredible day, not only for them but for my mom and the whole crew,” Mike Jr. recalled. “Ted had the Mystique No. 13 car and was obviously doing great and the car owner, Mr. Jimmy Galante, asked my dad if he would want to race. So they built a car exactly like Ted’s, same paint scheme, just with the No. 82 on the side of it. And they finished one-two at New Hampshire.
“My dad, my uncle, they all went to Victory Lane together because it was pretty much like a we-both-won kind of deal. You can’t get much better than that.”
Moments like that leave a lasting impression on a 5-year-old kid from Connecticut, but Mike Jr. was lucky enough to witness many.
Another that stands out to the newest member of the Christopher racing clan happened a few years later, in 2008. His uncle Ted, at the age of 50, won his first and only NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour championship.
“I didn’t understand racing that much, back then because I was just so young,” Mike Jr. said. “I knew (Ted) was really determined to chase that Tour championship and finally got this opportunity in the Eddie Whelan car.
“I remember going to Thompson for that World Series weekend. That was a big deal for him and the Christopher family, too.”
The Christopher family has long been associated with the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour. Ted earned 42 Tour victories in addition to his 2008 championship before he was killed in a plane crash in 2017. Mike competed in 75 Tour events through the years, earning five top-five finishes.
These days the Christopher family continues to make memories on the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour, but now it’s Mike Jr. who is the author.
Following in the footsteps of his late uncle and his father, Mike Jr. began racing go karts when he was 10 at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway. He said the push to go racing came not from his father, but from his mother.
Mike Christopher Jr. during his first NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour event at Riverhead Raceway on Sept. 18, 2021. (Photo: Adam Glanzman/NASCAR)
“It was actually my mom who got me to the track almost every single week,” Mike Jr. said. “My dad’s dad, my Grampy, also brought me to Stafford every single week for the weekly racing that Ted did. It’s just something I grew up with. Going to the tracks every single week and watching Ted race, and whenever my dad raced too, watching that. It’s just something you grow up with.”
Modified racing has a strong tendency to attract generational family involvement, something Mike Jr. attributes to the fact that it’s mostly based in the Northeast.
“It’s a very specific subset of racing,” Mike Jr. said. “It’s primarily in the Northeast; that’s where it grew up from, and it’s stayed there the whole time in the New England, New York, Pennsylvania. It doesn’t really venture much outside of that.
“The idea of having generational teams or families that grow up and continue Modified racing I think stems from that. They do have Southern tours and series, but that’s kind of newer. Modified racing in the Northeast has been around since the dawn of NASCAR racing. I mean, it is the oldest division, so it kind of makes sense that this subset, this genre of racing has grown up to be so popular among Northeast families.
“You think about racing in the Northeast, and its Modified country. We do have Supers (Supermodifieds) and Late Models and stuff like that, but it’s nothing compared to Modified racing up here.”
Now 23, Mike Jr. has begun making a name for himself on the Northeastern Modified scene. He’s become a fixture at tracks like Stafford Motor Speedway and Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park, and last year he made his NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour debut at New York’s Riverhead Raceway driving for Tommy Baldwin Jr.
The partnership between Baldwin and Mike Jr. has been fruitful, with the duo earning several victories so far this season.
Mike Christopher Jr., driver of the No. 7 Tommy Baldwin Racing Modified, celebrates after winning the Jennerstown Salutes 150 for the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour at Jennerstown Speedway on May 28, 2022. (Photo: Nate Smallwood/NASCAR)
“(Baldwin) came to me in like 2019 maybe, something like that, and we ran a couple of one-off races and just kept building on that,” Mike Jr. said. “He puts a lot of work and effort into getting me specifically to the track with sponsorship and stuff like that. We raced last year and won some races, and I guess he saw that there was some kind of potential here to go out and win races.”
One of the aforementioned victories for the pairing this year came at Pennsylvania’s Jennerstown Speedway on May 28 in the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour Jennerstown Salutes 150. It was Mike Jr.’s first Tour victory in just his third start.
“I just feel like I have an incredible car and team behind me,” Mike Jr. said. “Everything felt right to where the chances were good even before the race started that we were going to win, because Tommy’s just been on his game.”
With his first NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour victory out of the way, the question now is what’s next.
He doesn’t currently have an answer.
Christopher is not scheduled for any more Tour events this season, but he hopes to secure an opportunity to contest the full schedule in the coming years.
How that’s going to happen is the greatest unknown.
“Obviously I want to race Tour races, but I feel accomplished with winning the one race and I want more,” he said. “It’s a question I’ve been wrestling for the past couple months, year, or so. Just growing up and realizing you’re not a kid anymore. You think you’re going to be a race car driver, but reality is setting in.
“You’ve got to figure out what you’ve got to do personally to make money and also what you have to do to follow your dreams. It’s definitely a deep, philosophical question that you’re trying to wrestle with and answer.”
RICHMOND, Va. — Kevin Harvick’s latest milestone victory in a storied NASCAR Cup Series career was also the perfect counter, a challenge to the sayers of nay who had dismissed the competitive verve of the veteran driver and his Stewart-Haas Racing team.
“It’s kind of like when they put those small boxes in the newspaper where they have to correct their story and you can’t hardly read them,” Harvick said with a smile. “I feel like a lot of you should put those at the bottom of your story. I get great gratification out of that.”
The ink reserved for small-print retractions flowed after Harvick’s defiant late surge to win Sunday’s Federated Auto Parts 400 at Richmond Raceway. The 46-year-old driver, written off to the playoff fringe not that long ago, now has the head of steam from two consecutive victories – an awakening of the sleeping giant just in time to make hay in the 10-race postseason.
The triumph also provided some historical perspective. Reaching his 60th win made him the co-leader among active Cup Series drivers, tied with Kyle Busch. But the big, round number also gave him a closer view of the names ahead of him on the all-time list – Earnhardt, Yarborough, Johnson, Allison, Waltrip, Gordon, Pearson, all the way up to Petty.
In terms of his late-career streak, Harvick also ranks a firm third on the list of all-time wins after age 40. His 29 wins past that age milestone sit behind Lee Petty’s 42 and Bobby Allison’s 38. It also allowed him to invoke the name of Harry Gant, who captivated the NASCAR world in 1991 with his electric four-race win streak – a run of success at age 51 that gave him the nickname “Mr. September.”
Harvick needed his memory jogged as a reminder of what month it is, and ultimately joked that he might be willing to try “Mr. August” on for size. That said, Harvick indicated that the time to reflect on the scope of his career will come later. Until then, it’s focus forward.
“I’ve always prided myself in trying to be competitive and do what it takes to be competitive and make the sacrifices that it takes to be competitive. But I do enjoy it,” Harvick said. “There’s nothing better than winning. That’s what we do. I don’t know how to really put it all into perspective because it’s just not something that I just stop and really ever look at. I never really stop and say, where are all those 60 wins? The first one is easy. Today is easy to remember. Last week is easy to remember. But if you guys wouldn’t have told me that the last race that we won was at Bristol, I would have argued with you. I would have told you it was Darlington.
“I don’t really look at the numbers. It’s always about — maybe this is a fault of mine, but I think it’s also one of the reasons that we progress forward. But it’s never about what you have done, what the numbers look like. It’s what do we got to do next week, what could we have done better last week, how do we keep this all in perspective.”
The victory celebration also allowed for a brief moment of reflection for Rodney Childers, Harvick’s longtime collaborator as crew chief of Stewart-Haas’ No. 4 Ford team. For Childers, Richmond marked a milestone with his 40th Cup Series win, 37 of which have come since the driver and crew chief first paired up in 2014.
Childers said he thought back to Victory Lane at Phoenix Raceway early in the 2018 season, just as Harvick had gone on another three-race tear to achieve his 40th win. “I remember that day, and wondering if I would ever get there,” Childers said.
The only wonder now is how many more the two can rack up, now that the 65-race drought is even further in the past.
“It started two months ago, and you could just see everybody — the communication and the confidence and the cars we were building and all that stuff just got better,” Childers said. “It doesn’t take a lot of confidence with our group to make a huge difference.”
RICHMOND, Va. – Martin Truex Jr.’s hopes for a playoff-clinching victory at a track that’s been a strong suit opened with promise – based on his favorable history, his strength in practice and qualifying, and a prime starting spot for Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series at Richmond Raceway.
Some 24 hours later, the Saturday speed from the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota didn’t translate to Sunday’s Federated Auto Parts 400. Truex rallied from a lap down to claim seventh place at the end, but lost ground to the 10th-place finisher Ryan Blaney in their contest for the final slot on the postseason grid.
With stage points on his side, Blaney padded his advantage as the last driver provisionally in the 16-driver playoff field. Truex dipped from a 19-point deficit relative to the postseason cutline to a 26-point gap behind Blaney’s bubble spot with two regular-season races remaining.
“Honestly, it was nothing like yesterday. I don’t know. We’re kind of at a loss right now thinking about why,” said Truex, who was fifth in practice and sixth in qualifying. “At the end of the day, just not good enough. Really battled hard and made a lot of great adjustments. I mean, Stage 2 there, I thought we were going to finish 20th at best, you know what I mean. It was pretty bad, but kept working on it and got better and ended up with a decent finish, just not what we needed to do here.”
Truex faded through the running order early on, clinging to 10th place at the end of Stage 1 on Lap 70. The second stage was more of a challenge. Some slight contact from Ricky Stenhouse Jr.’s No. 47 Chevrolet at pit entry gave the team a scare, and Truex lost a lap in a mid-stage pit-stop cycle. He unlapped himself on Lap 221, just before the second intermission.
When asked what Truex needed, crew chief James Small quipped: “A better handling race car. We just started off way tighter than we thought. There’s no reason why we should have been tight. I have no (expletive) idea. But yeah, just got behind and worked on it. You know, he drove his (expletive) off all day and got back on the lead lap all by himself. We made it better at the end, it just wasn’t good enough. We just … we were average, and we needed to be exceptional today.”
That especially stung at Richmond, where Truex entered the weekend as a pre-race favorite with a string of seven consecutive top-five results.
“Of course. We come here every time expecting to win, every year since 2017, 2016, we’ve been really good here,” Small said. ” And today, it was probably the most mediocre performance we’ve had at Richmond in a long time. So yeah, it just is what it is, and we move on.”
Blaney, meanwhile, finished where he started in 10th, but placing sixth and fifth at the stage junctures helped the No. 12 Team Penske driver hold the line and make a slight gain in the playoff picture.
“Obviously, a couple things worked in our favor,” said Jonathan Hassler, No. 12 crew chief. “We got a repeat winner; we made a few points on it. So obviously, not the result that we wanted, but certainly could be a lot worse.”
The quest for the final playoff spot turns the page to its final two weeks, with races next Sunday at Watkins Glen International and then the regular-season finale at Daytona on Aug. 27. With Richmond’s mystery chapter in the books, Truex says the approach for the next two events will keep the same outlook.
“The same. You just go out and fight, man,” Truex said. “You go give it all you got. There’s no magic triggers. Just go trying to figure it out and work hard and race hard and see what we can come up with.”
RICHMOND, Va. – Last Sunday at Michigan, Kevin Harvick broke a 65-race drought.
Now the driver of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford has a two-race winning streak.
Chased by runner-up Christopher Bell and third-place finisher Chris Buescher over the closing laps, Harvick threaded his way through traffic to win Sunday’s Federated Auto Parts 400 at Richmond Raceway by 0.441 seconds.
The NASCAR Cup Series victory was Harvick’s fourth at the 0.75-mile short track — his first there since 2013 — and the 60th of his career, tying him with Kyle Busch for most among active drivers and ninth all-time.
Harvick led twice for 55 laps, passing eventual sixth-place finisher Joey Logano for the lead on Lap 334 and regaining it from Denny Hamlin on Lap 353 at the end of a cycle of green-flag pit stops.
“It’s like I said last week, the cars have been running good week-in and week-out,” Harvick said, “and you see that we have a lot better understanding of what’s going on with how we adjusted on the car after the first run and were able to get our car handling a lot better.
“I think as it got dark, the race track really came to our Mobil 1 Ford Mustang.”
By pitting one circuit earlier than Logano on Lap 340, Buescher leap-frogged the Team Penske driver and began to chase Harvick, who led the final 48 laps. Buescher got to Harvick’s bumper in traffic but couldn’t make a run for the lead.
The driver of the No. 17 Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing Ford lost his chance for a serendipitous victory when Harvick lapped Bubba Wallace and Buescher stayed trapped behind Wallace’s No. 23 Toyota and fell two seconds behind.
“Just burned the rear tires up,” said Buescher, who needs a victory to qualify for the Cup Playoffs. “Ultimately that’s on me. Lapped traffic didn’t do us any favors, either, but ultimately just got to keep the rears under us a little bit better so we can have a little bit better shot there to get after him for the win.”
On 12-lap fresher tires, Bell charged forward, slipped past Buescher on Lap 396 of 400 and closed on Harvick before running out of time.
“Well, I knew he was coming, but I forgot to shift down the front straightaway the last time,” Harvick said. “I was not paying attention, and he got closer than he should have. I made a mistake there a couple laps doing the same thing. I wasn’t shifting on the back, and I was shifting on the front. There was a lot going on, and made a couple mistakes, let him get too close.”
Bell, who already has a victory to his credit this season, seemed pleased with the runner-up result.
“Really, really proud of (crew chief) Adam Stevens, this entire 20 group,” Bell said. “The Rheem Camry didn’t feel very good at the beginning, and we had our fair share of troubles (including a spin on Lap 250), and the pit crew really came through at the end there with some blazing stops and allowed us to get in front of the 11 (Hamlin), who was on the same strategy as us and get up there and contend.”
In the battle for the last position in the Playoffs, Ryan Blaney widened his advantage over Martin Truex Jr. despite finishing 10th to Truex’s seventh. The difference was in stage points. Blaney scored 11 to none for Truex and now leads the 2017 series champion by 26 with two races left in the regular season.
Hamlin came home fourth, followed by Chase Elliott. Logano led a race-high 222 laps, but his No. 22 Ford wasn’t as strong in the twilight as it had been earlier in the race.
“Yeah, I think just as the sun went down and the track cooled off, (we) lost some turn on our car,” Logano said. “Kevin and some others got a lot better the last couple of runs in the race. When it was hot and slick, that was probably our strength with the Shell Pennzoil Mustang.”
Thursday, August 18
7:30 a.m., Best of Radioactive: 2022 season (re-air), FS1
6 p.m., NASCAR Race Hub: Boundless: Betty Skelton, FS1
6 p.m., Dale Jr. Download, Peacock
7 p.m., Game Night: Xfinity Series Edition, FS1
9:30 p.m., Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane: To Catch a Prankster, USA Network
12:02 a.m., Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane (r-air), USA Network
12:33 a.m., Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane (re-air), USA Network
Friday, August 19 5 p.m., NASCAR Race Hub, FS1
6 p.m., ARCA Menards Series: General Tire Delivers 100, FS1
On MRN:
6 p.m., ARCA Menards Series: General Tire Delivers 100
Saturday, August 20 12 a.m., ARCA Menards Series: General Tire Delivers 100 (re-air), FS1
6 a.m., ARCA Menards Series: General Tire Delivers 100 (re-air), FS1
8:30 a.m., ARCA Menards Series: General Tire Delivers 100 (re-air), FS2
10 a.m., NASCAR Xfinity Series practice/qualifying at Watkins Glen International, NBC Sports App
12 p.m., NASCAR Cup Series practice/qualifying at Watkins Glen International, NBC Sports App
12:30 p.m., NASCAR Cup Series practice/qualifying at Watkins Glen International, USA
2 p.m., Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane (r-air), USA Network
2:30 p.m., Countdown to Green, USA Network
3 p.m., NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Watkins Glen, USA Network
5:30 p.m., NASCAR Xfinity Series post-race show, USA Network
1:30 a.m., Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane (re-air), USA Network
On MRN: 12 p.m., NASCAR Cup Series: Pole Qualifying
2:30 p.m., NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Watkins Glen
Sunday, August 21 12:30 p.m., NASCAR RaceDay, FS1
2 p.m., Countdown to Green, USA Network
3 p.m., NASCAR Cup Series: Go Bowling at The Glen from Watkins Glen, USA Network, NBC Sports App (UPDATE: UNDERWAY AFTER DELAY)
5:30 p.m., NASCAR Cup Series post-race show, USA Network
On MRN: 2 p.m., NASCAR Cup Series: Go Bowling at The Glen from Watkins Glen
The NASCAR Cup Series drivers are ready to race 400 laps for Sunday’s Federated Auto Parts 400 at Richmond Raceway (3 p.m. ET, USA, NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM).
As much as they are ready to go, bettors should be prepared to pause a bit when looking at Saturday’s practice times for today’s race.
Track conditions changed drastically between the first and second practice groups, relegating the second group to times nearly half a second slower per lap than the first group.
That means we need to analyze each group separately and add in track history, as well as performance on this track type and tire combination this year.
When combining all those factors, I’ve dug up one driver that stands out in a multitude of bets.
My favorite of the bunch is below.
NASCAR Pick for Richmond
*Odds as of Sunday morning
Let’s start simple.
Joey Logano has finished in the top five in 11 of his last 18 starts at Richmond. For those scoring at home, that’s a 77.8% rate.
Those last 18 starts are significant, because that marks the debut of the Gen-6 car.
Yes, Logano’s one start in the Next Gen car was earlier this year where he finished 17th. But remember, Logano was running strongly all day until a faulty jack on a late pit stop cost him dearly.
Now add in his on track performance this weekend, and he shines.
On first glance, you may tell yourself, “Logano was only 13th in practice.”
On second glance, you may say, “He only had the 10th best 10-lap average.”
Both of those are true.
It’s also true that he was the fastest driver in both of those times among his practice group.
That’s because he went out in the slower second group, where changing track conditions meant that no driver could put up a time within about 0.4 seconds of the fastest time in the first group.
It’s also true he was on pace for a much better qualifying lap until a wobble dropped him to his current 17th-place starting spot.
Oh, did I mention he has the best average running position on this tire this year?
Put simply, we’re getting a driver that:
Has a 61.1% success rate at finishing in the top five at this track over an 18-race sample size
Was fastest in his practice group
Has the best average running position on this tire this year
The +300 line at the Kambi books is an absolute steal. Even at DraftKings, where he’s +250, there’s value.
My model says he should be +220 for a break-even bet, and I think that’s underrating him. That’s because it’s impossible to appropriately quantify his practice and qualifying times.
The Bet: Joey Logano, top-five finish, +300 | Bet to: +200
Between Group A and Group B in Saturday’s qualifying session at Richmond Raceway, there was a drastic shift in track conditions, allowing most cars in the second group to run quicker lap times. Ross Chastain said he never saw a change in lap times compared to that of Saturday. Hendrick Motorsports capitalized on the cooler track temperature, slotting three of its four cars inside the top five. Meanwhile, its fourth driver, Chase Elliott, will start the race from 23rd position.
Dustin Albino’s race-day lineup: Starter 1: Martin Truex Jr.
Starter 2: Denny Hamlin
Starter 3: Ross Chastain
Starter 4: Kyle Larson
Starter 5: Kevin Harvick
Garage pick: Kyle Busch
NEXT IN LINE: William Byron, Christopher Bell, Alex Bowman, Brad Keselowski
RISING: When thinking of short tracks, specifically Richmond, Larson doesn’t come to the top of mind, despite winning at the track in 2017. The No. 5 team enters Sunday’s race with consecutive top-six finishes at the 0.75-mile track and will start from the pole for the third time in 2022 (Daytona and Sonoma).
As noted heavily over the past two months, Bowman has had very little to be blissful about. Last week at Michigan, the No. 48 scored its first top-10 result since the Coca-Cola 600 in May, but he has recent success at Richmond, which includes a win last April. His fifth-place starting position ties his best effort since starting on the front row in the Daytona 500.
FALLING: While starting 29th isn’t ideal, Kyle Busch isn’t worried. He said so while talking to NBC Sports following his qualifying effort. Still, the No. 18 team sits in my garage to start the race based on his six prior wins — and nine straight top 10s — at the track. There will, however, be heavy traffic directly in front of him at the start.
That Elliott was the lone Hendrick car to miss the final round of qualifying is a disappointment. More concerning for the No. 9 team is it’s the team’s third-worst starting position of the season. On paper, Elliott’s track record at Richmond doesn’t look bad, with an average finish of 11.5. Many of those the team overachieved. But historically, short, flat tracks are among his worst on the circuit, aside from Martinsville.
FEATURED MATCHUPS:
Kevin Harvick vs. Denny Hamlin
Combined, these two have seven wins at Richmond and finished 1-2 in the spring race. Snapping a 65-race winless streak, Harvick is bound to win another race sooner rather than later. But it won’t be this week, because Hamlin is an elite short track racer at the Cup level. Advantage goes to the No. 11 team.
Kyle Busch vs. Martin Truex Jr.
Entering Sunday, Truex is in a foreign position for this time of the season: below the playoff cutline. While I do expect Busch to extend his top-10 streak to 10 races at Richmond, Truex might be my pick to win the race. The No. 19 team dominated at New Hampshire last month, a similar track layout to Richmond.
Ryan Blaney vs. Joey Logano
No driver wants to be in the position Blaney is. Though second in the championship standings, there’s a real shot that he misses the postseason. So, does he chase points or go for the win? Given he has just two top-10 results in 12 Richmond races — the last two at that — one would think he will be points racing this weekend. And with Logano locked into the playoffs, Team Penske is likely putting all its eggs into the No. 12 team’s basket.
Chase Elliott vs. Christopher Bell
Arguably, these two drivers had the most disappointing Saturday at Richmond. Elliott was third in practice on best 10-lap average, so it would be understandable to choose him with long green-flag runs expected. But Bell has proven to be stellar at tracks like Richmond and New Hampshire, so the No. 20 team will likely find a way to be in contention for a good result from its 21st starting position.
