This Saturday Night the NASCAR Sprint Cup teams begin a stretch where most of them will likely be home for close to three weeks. Just about everyone involved with a NASCAR Cup team lives around the Charlotte area. This week they have the NASCAR All Star race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway and then the following week they’ll run the Coca-Cola 600 on the same track before heading to Dover on June 1st. The trip from last weeks race at Darlington is only about an hour and a half away from the Charlotte area so everyone should be relaxed, comfortable, and well rested for the next few weeks.
The Format for the All-Star race is set to ensure the winners from the last year are all involved. There is a qualifying race that allows for some of the lesser drivers to race their way in and then there is a fan vote that allows for one driver to be voted in. In all, there are 24 drivers that will be participating for their share of the $3.3 million dollar purse. The winner of the event will win over $1 million. Needless to say, that kind of cash will not produce the traditional type of All-Star game like other sports have where everyone goes through motions, all smiles and joking with each other.
The stakes are so high in this one that the only loyalty a driver has on the track is for himself. There are no teammates, no friends or family. Last season in this race, Kyle Busch wanted to win so bad he pushed his car to the limit until it ultimately wrecked himself into his brother, Kurt Busch, ending the race for both of them. That one scene of two brothers wrecking each other is the perfect synopsis to what this race is all about.
To narrow down the top candidates to win, we have to begin looking at the results from this seasons races at Las Vegas, Atlanta, and Texas because of how similar Charlotte is to those three facilities. Whoever had things figured out in those three races will be on their game this week for the All-Star race as well as next week in the Coca-Cola 600. The list of top drivers in those races begins with Carl Edwards who won at Las Vegas and Texas. The Jack Roush team really has things figured out on the high banked mile and a half tracks. Last season it was Jimmie Johnson who dominated on all those tracks and the previous year it was Kasey Kahne. If there is one thing we saw in each of Johnson and Kahne’s cases was they just didn’t stop at winning two, they just about won them all.
Edwards will definitely be the driver to beat and he’ll likely win the Coca-Cola 600 next week, but this race seems like its destined to be either Dale Earnhardt Jr’s or Kyle Busch’s. The two have a great rivalry going and both have a little bit of a mean streak in them that makes it possible to believe they would bump anyone out of the way for $1 million. Junior seems to be the choice of the two because he has become the King of non-points races, which this one is. Junior won the Bud Shootout and a Gatorade Duel at Daytona, but hasn’t won a real race in 73 races.
So we’ll go with Junior to win the race because of his attitude and also because he’s got a pretty good car. At Vegas, Junior finished second to Edwards. In Atlanta, Junior was third and in Texas he was 12th. He won this race as a rookie in 2000 and was chosen to do so by Lowe’s Motor Speedway president, Humpy Wheeler. Wheeler has picked 10 of the last 19 winners in the All-Star race, however, he has been in a two year slump. Wheeler is supposed to reveal his choice on Wednesday and we’ll definitely be taking notes on it here in Las Vegas. I’ll say Humpy breaks out of his slump and chooses Junior.
TOP 5 All-Star Race Finish prediction:
#88 Dale Earnhardt Jr (4/1)
#18 Kyle Busch (6/1)
#99 Carl Edwards (9/2)
#11 Denny Hamlin (8/1)
#20 Tony Stewart (10/1)
NASCAR Contest
NASCAR Last Man Standing contest is revving up again. After several requests from NASCAR fans around the city, the Fiesta Rancho and Henderson sports books will be offering another NASCAR Last Man Standing Elimination contest with the same rules. The contest begins May 25th with the Coca-Cola 600 and runs through the end of the season, or until one person remains. The first contest had over 400 entrants and it took 11 weeks for the eventual winner to be the Last Man Standing. The format is simple, pick one of the 10 matchups listed each week. If the pick is chosen correctly, you get to move on to the following week. The sign-up fee is $25 and if you buy three you get one free. The Grand Prize is a guaranteed $10,000.
INDY 500 odds
Station Casino Sports Books opened their odds on the 94th running of the Indianapolis 500 on Monday, the latest we have opened Indy 500 odds in 10 years. The reason is quite simply because there is no fan interest and no one has asked for it. We have offered odds on every Indy race during the season and get minimal action, it’s only a small fraction of what is generated by NASCAR. I would anticipate the Coca-Cola 600 at least doubling what handle we do for the Indy 500. By the way, Ganassi teammates, Dan Wheldon and Scott Dixon, were installed as 9/2 co-favorites. Danica Patrick is listed as the seventh choice at 12 to 1.
Micah Roberts is a Race and Sports Director for Station Casinos in Las Vegas , Nevada who covers motor sports from both a bettor and bookmaker's perspective.
