NASCAR DFS Playbook Wurth 400: Weather and Kyle Larson Star at Dover

The odds on favorite for the race, at least prior to Saturday, and him starting P18 doesn’t really change that. He has the track history here to move up and has been fast in every package all year. The price is a bit prohibitive this week given where the budget guys are starting but as long as you live in the mid-tier for most of the build, Larson can be fairly easily included. Expect him to be perhaps the most popular driver on the board.

He’s back, right? Sorry, I didn’t think they ran the commercials this week like the last two. Is there any reason not to play him? Not really. The P10 starting spot gives him some PD and a shot to win pretty easily given the rate that top-10 starters win here plus his track history. Speaking of that history he has two wins and five top-fives in the last eight races here. The leg seems to be just fine after surviving Talladega and Martinsville though Dover could test it a bit more given the forces on the track. Either way, it’s not a concern for DFS in the least.

This is an interesting spot for Bell. Historically it’s not been his best track with just one top-20 in his four races here. Though, that P4 finish was the last time here which helps. He’s also been the fastest Toyota all year this year and is starting P2. That should help him stay up front and perhaps lead some laps as well. There’s a chance he gets overlooked a bit at this price tag with HMS drivers above and some other laps-led leader possibilities who are cheaper. He fits in GPP builds but there could be some negative PD in his future with this spot.

It’s his home track. I know we say that a lot but this one is geographically the closest to his hometown and that has shown up in the performance. He’s won here a few times and in the last eight races, he has five top-fives. It also hasn’t much mattered where he’s started either as he started P17 three races ago, where he’s starting Sunday (or Monday), and he locked down a top-five. You also have to think that his brother winning his first race on Saturday gives MTJ some mojo boost too right?

The pole-sitter here seems like a great play right? Well, sure they could lead laps early, though a competition caution might change the outlook on that. But historically, the pole-sitter hasn’t won since 2010 and that assumes the pole-sitter has good speed. What we saw from Busch in practice, for what it’s worth, wasn’t great speed in the least. Unless the big swings they took during practice work, he is a risky play outside of leading laps early and then hoping he hangs on to a top-10 finish.

He’s just too consistent here to not include. I don’t really care what his speed is or isn’t or has been or hasn’t been. His record here speaks for itself. In the last eight races here he has two wins and no finish worse than P9 including five in the top-four. In three of the last four races here he’s started P10, P17, and P11 so he can move up from P12 to nab another top-five again.

The talent is there but the consistency hasn’t been yet. We can say that about his history at Dover as well. This hasn’t been the strongest track for him in the past but the question is was it him or the team that led to that. We’ve seen JGR and Toyota perform well here in the past but Chevy teams outside of HMS not so much. So does his manufacturer swap help him this week? I guess we’ll find out in short order and he has the ability to be a sneaky laps-led factor starting P7.

To be honest, the only real reason he’s in the playbook is because of his starting spot. He’ll be rolling off P26 and despite the rough start to the year for Penske he just has too much PD upside to be ignored in the mid-tier of prices. It could be a long day for him and his teammates if the setups, that were brand new for Penske, aren’t right or they could’ve nailed it and we get the points from Logano we’ve been expecting all year. He’s also been on an every-other-race-run over the last six with 84, 53, and 64 DK points every other race to go with 1, -21, and -7 in the others. He’s on the high side of the trend this week…theoretically.

I can’t quit Blaney. He’s like a bad habit at this point, isn’t that right Edward Raus? He just has been so good here at times and has shown speed all year that it has to land him in Victory Lane at some point right? The issues though are steep. Team Penske hasn’t been good here recently and started with a brand new setup that basically got no practice time plus if he doesn’t have speed, the P3 starting spot will bite him with negative PD. Play at your own risk.

If we’re taking stock in practice he was quick with the best single-lap and one of the better 5-lap averages. He’ll be starting P4 as well thanks to a good finish at Talladega last weekend. If he can bring that speed, and it holds, he’ll be in position to nab a top-five which is value at this price. There is risk that the speed doesn’t show and he drops back fairly decently in the pack.

Here we go again with Berry in an HMS Chevy. This time though it’s in place of the injured Alex Bowman. He did win here in the Xfinity race here last year and has nailed down a few top-10s in the Cup Series this year. He’ll be starting P23 which gives him a ton of PD and as the cheapest HMS driver he will be popular as well as he can be paired nicely with any of the other three.

The main reason Stenhouse is here is because the qualifying order was set via formula and thus grifted him a top-10 starting spot. Dover has been a tough track to pass at previously and starting in the top-10 should give him a path to holding that spot. Not to mention that Stenhouse has been better at shorter, tougher passing, tracks this year as well. He’s a GPP play for leverage on a top-10 starter.

Are we surprised he’s in the playbook? He continues to show up and be a solid lower-salary play most weeks. Now we have a track that fits his style again and he’s starting P30. That gives us PD from a short-track driver who’s finished in the top-20 here a couple of times in the last six trips to the track.

It’s not been the best year for Almirola to be sure and the Fords have been questionable in this package. That’s not a ringing endorsement for sure, however, this is a track that he’s been interesting at previously. Almirola has finished between P7 and P19 in all but one of the past eight races here regardless of what the rest of the season has seen. Almirola is a leverage play for GPPs only to pivot some of the more popular drivers in this same price range.

Yes, he spun his car three laps into practice. Yes, he’s going to a backup car. However, he’s starting dead last. So basically no negative points from him and only positive upside if the setup in the car is better. The RCR cars have looked pretty solid in intermediate packages this year and his average finish in the last eight Dover races is 16.4. Even if he finishes in the mid-20s there’s value here and that likely makes him incredibly popular.

Gilliland has been on a nice roll of late with good finishes. We’ll be riding that one more time this weekend. He’ll roll off P35, aka a free square for PD, and he’s previously run in the 20s his last race here. This simply comes down to playing a guy on a roll with big PD upside if that roll continues.

The only race in the Cup Series that Burton has run here he finished P24 after starting in the 30s. That’s a good start but what else is there? This year at Auto Club and Vegas he moved up well in this intermediate package and then at Richmond and Martinsville, where it’s tough to pass, he moved up well again. That’s what Burton brings this week. A shot to move up and a low-20s finish should hit value.