Looking for a sport to replace NFL as your Sunday sport for a while? Unlike other sports, NASCAR starts off with its biggest event at Daytona this week and it’s a perfect chance to try something new. I’m going to go over the basic NASCAR strategy, a review of the track, then unleash my picks for the week.

NASCAR Strategy – Scoring

Finish

If your driver finishes 1st he/she gets 46 points. After that it goes 2nd 42 pts, 3rd 41 pts, 4th 40 pts continuing one by one to the bottom. Drivers of a higher pedigree tend to finish higher, but identifying the winners is harder than identifying plays based on place differential.

Place Differential

Drivers get 1 point per place difference from their starting point. If your driver starts in 40th and finishes 20th he’ll get 20 points. Likewise if he starts 20th and finishes 40th he’ll get -20 points. With negative points coming into play it’s important to dodge guys who start high and trend downwards, as it can sink an entire lineup.

Lead Laps

Drivers get .25 pts per lead lap. This is why you usually want to take at least one guy who qualified at the top. In a typical beginning of a race, the 1st and 2nd place drivers will fight for the lead in the first lap, then whoever pulls out front will begin to collect lead laps. In some races, drivers can lead 200 or more laps. This makes them necessary to have on your team to cash in gpps and sometimes cash games. When making a lineup, you usually want to have at least 1 driver designated to collecting lead laps.

Fastest Laps

Drivers get .5 pts per fastest lap. Fastest laps are usually pretty spread out among the non-scrub cars. It usually goes to whoever’s pit the soonest, but at the beginning of a race it usually goes to whoever pulls out in front for a little while. Outside of guessing who will pull out in front, fastest laps are usually impossible to guess.

NASCAR Strategy- The 3 Steps To Lineup Construction

1. Who will be my lap leader?

With each roster you need to allocate 1 or 2 spots to guys who you think will lead the most laps. These are almost always going to be expensive players because it’s rare for a lower tier driver to be able to hang on to the lead. The pole sitter usually takes the lead initially, as he’s given the advantage of being able to pick his lane. Sometimes the 2nd place driver will beat them off the turn, especially if they’re a much stronger driver than 1st place. Teammate positioning can be key to taking the lead initially. If a driver has a teammate positioned right behind him, he’s likely to team up and draft with him to get pushed into 1st place. A very valid strategy is building teams with teammates stacked together. Lead Laps matter more or less depending on how many laps are in the race. You could have 80 laps at a road race or 500 laps at Bristol. Tracks with a low lap total favor place differential plays, as where small tracks can have players racking up 100+ point scores from all the lead laps.

2. Who will get me place differential points?

This will likely determine the last 4/5 spots in your lineup. Always look for drivers of a high pedigree who messed up in qualifying and will start near the back of the pack. These are the safest drivers to pick, as they’re certain to gain points instead of losing them. Some weeks there are no obvious plays in the back of the field, so you have to gamble on random scrubs who start low and hope they survive through crashes and place decently.

3. Who should I load up on/fade because of ownership?

The smartest way to play NASCAR is multi-entering 10-50+ lineups in gpp and build them all based on different scenarios you can think of. Week to week ownership can be predictable so you might be able to gain a large edge on the field by fading a player expected to be heavily owned and hoping he crashes or finishes low. I usually target mid-range/low end drivers who qualified high and Dale Earnhardt Jr. because he’s always overowned week to week. (except not this week) The players at the bottom tend to have more spread out ownership. No one driver seems to ever be owned more than 60% so going in 70-80% ownership on one player that you think is safe can give you an edge. I usually do this with guys who start at the very bottom and can only go up.

NASCAR Strategy- Crashes

Crashes suck, but you can use them to your advantage. Crashes are why multi-entering gpps and hedging your picks are so important in NASCAR. If you’re not in 100% with every player you probably still have a good chance of having a good lineup even after a big crash. Crashes are usually impossible to predict, and most people in them didn’t do anything wrong. My philosophy is to ignore them 100% from week to week and load up on guys who crashed last week. Recency bias makes players mad at drivers who screwed them last week so those drivers will be lower owned than they should. When building lineups, try stacking certain parts of the field, especially if it’s on a track where big accidents are known to occur. The front of the pack is always the safest, but think of scenarios like the front, middle, or back crashing and picking around those areas.

NASCAR Strategy- Track Types

Some drivers perform differently on different types of tracks. For example, A.J. Allmendinger is usually a lower mid-range driver, but on a road course he’s a top tier option. Some tracks are more accident-prone than others, and have different types of accidents. On the big restrictor plate tracks like Daytona and Talledega, fans always await ‘the big one’ where a bunch of packed up drivers crash together. Some tracks like Kentucky usually only have a spinout or two and crashes don’t pile up much. I’ll try and give a good overview on the different track types each week as the season goes along.

Daytona Track Overview

Daytona is one of the biggest tracks in NASCAR at 2.5 miles long. Like its fellow superspeedway Talladega, Daytona runs as a restrictor-plate race. This limits top speeds and helps limit the ability of the super fast cars to gain an edge on the field. Because of this, and the likelihood of big crashes, it’s less predictable than a usual race. There’s more value than normal to scrub drivers at the very back, as they’ll be much less likely to be lapped and more likely to jump a lot of spots if they survive a big crash. There are only 200 laps which is a bit on the lower end. Historically drivers don’t tend to shuffle around too much, but can jump places really quick when there are big crashes. There’s plenty of recent history to go off of, as Daytona is raced at twice a year. However, since humongous wrecks shake up the field every time, going off of track history can be a bit misleading. A few drivers have showed consistent performance here over long stretches of time. Matt Kenseth, Jimmie Johnson, Martin Truex Jr, A.J. Allmendinger, and Brian Scott have to go to the back because of switches to backup cars but DK scoring will count them in their original qualifying spots.

Lap Leader Picks

Chase Elliott $8,500

This will be Chase’s first official Sprint Cup race replacing Jeff Gordon in the 24 car. In limited races last year, Chase looked excellent for a driver his age. He won the Xfinity series championship in 2014 so he’s a proven winner. He gets a great advantage to begin with because Kenseth in 2nd place is forced to drop to the back because he switched to a backup car. This guarantees Elliott some lead laps to begin the race, but the problem is his teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr who qualified in 3rd right behind him. Will Jr. let the rookie run in front for a bit, or take the lead himself? It’s probably wise to hold off on the unproven rookie who can only go down in place differential.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. $10,300

Dale Jr. won the Coke Zero 400 last July, the 2014 Daytona 500, and the first Can-Am Shootout Thursday to lock in his #3 spot. He leads in almost every statistical category here and has finished 9 of the last 10 races on the lead lap. He’s the safest candidate to lead the most laps and the Vegas favorite to win. Despite being the most expensive player on the board, expect his ownership to be the highest of all the top end drivers. He’s always overowned by the public anyway, and this is ‘his race.’ He has every reason to be highly owned but it’s smart to make a few rosters fading him in case he crashes or has complications.

Kyle Busch $9,100

The defending Sprint Cup champion is the only driver with a better Driver Rating than Dale Jr at Daytona in the last 10 years. Unlike Dale Jr. he’s yet to win here, but he has plenty of top 5 finishes. He starts 4th (3rd once Kenseth drops) and has the next best chance to take the lead after the 2 Hendricks drivers up front. He looked good in the 2nd Can-Am duel, taking the lead from Kenseth and never looking back. Unfortunately for him, his nearest JGR teammate is Carl Edwards at 10th so he doesn’t have any help at the beginning of the race.

Joey Logano $9,600

Logano starts 5th and is also a serious threat to take the lead. In the 2nd duel, Logano charged from last place to the front of the pack quickly and almost won. Like Busch, Logano doesn’t have teammate help as Keselowski starts all the way back in 25th. It’s still a very smart thing to pair him up with Keselowski, as they usually do well together.

Denny Hamlin $8,600

Sure Hamlin may be starting in 11th, but this is a track he’s dominated at with consistency over the last few years. I expect him to move up with his teammate Edwards in 10th to catch up with Kyle Busch up front. Hamlin had by far the fastest time in the last practice and has looked really strong all week. Hamlin seems to be written up as a top pick on every major DFS NASCAR outlet, so expect very heavy ownership on him. I’m guessing around 40%.

Place Differential Plays

Jimmie Johnson $9,900

Johnson officially qualified 26th but will have to go to the back of the pack to begin, causing him to start with negative points. This may deter some players but I think he’s a very safe bet to finish in the top 20 and has 1st place upside. He’s a top tier driver at Daytona historically and he won both races in 2013.

Ryan Newman $7,500

Newman left the qualifying duel early due to an engine problem and will start 2nd to last in 38th because of it. Newman has never been one to race well here, but he’s certain to pass all of the scrub drivers ahead of him and finish in the top 25. At his price tag he makes for a safe filler play.

Paul Menard $7,300

Menard starts 1 spot ahead of Newman and is pretty much the same skill level. In general, Newman is the stronger driver of the two, but Menard has done better at Daytona than Newman. Both make for solid plays.

Brad Keselowski $9,200

Keselowski starts 25th and because of his price tag, he may go overlooked. He was dominant in the 2nd duel until debris got in his grill and he got involved in a crash at the end. He doesn’t have to go to a backup car and should find his way into the top 15 at least, so he’s safe for 10+ differential points barring a crash.

Martin Truex Jr. $8,400

Like Johnson, Truex will have to go to the back despite officially qualifying 28th. Still, he should move up with ease. He was 2nd fastest in the last practice behind Hamlin, so his backup car seems perfectly fine. Truex was a top 10 machine last year and as an unusually low price tag for his skill level. His ownership should be near the top of the field.

Austin Dillon $7,600

Dillon starts 21st and always seems to make his way into the top 5 at some point in the race. He really came on strong towards the end of last season, and he’s raced very well here at Daytona. At the Coke Zero 400 he was going to finish in the top 5 until the huge crash happened and he ended up in the fence.

Aric Almirola $7,200

Almirola starting 34th is another solid cheap play. He usually finishes between 10th and 25th and ended last season on a very strong note. He won the Coke Zero 400 in 2014, so he’s a proven winner here.

A.J. Allmendinger $6,600

Allmendinger is at a crazy low price for his skill level. He starts 30th officially but has to go back to 39th to start. I still think he’s safe to land a top 25 finish. In his original car he qualified near the front for the duel and performed really well until he crashed.

Casey Mears $6,500

Mears starts 32nd and this is a track where he’s dominated at recently. He’s finished 11th, 6th, 4th, 10th, and 9th in his last 5 Daytona starts so he’s going to attract a ton of attention at his $6,500 price tag. He could be the highest owned driver along with Dale Jr. but I would not recommend fading him.

Drivers to Avoid

Matt Kenseth $9,000

Kenseth will have to start the race with down 34 places, due to him having to drop to the back of the pack. Kenseth is usually a very strong pick at Daytona, but with his starting position being 2nd he doesn’t have any upside at his price unless he comes all the way back and wins. With him being in a backup car, it’s probably safe to avoid him completely and hope the field doesn’t realize he’s going backwards.

Jamie McMurray $7,900

McMurray races pretty well here but 6th place is just too high of a starting position for him. He’ll probably fall down to the 10th-20th range, but he might stay in the top 10. He looked really strong in the duel which may attract people to picking him.

Ryan Blaney $7,400

Blaney consistently qualifies too high to play. Starting in 7th, he should drop a decent amount. He’ll probably end up anywhere from 15th-25th, but with this being his first official pro start we can’t be 100% sure about how good he’ll be. It’s best to be on the safe side and fade him.

David Ragan $5,900

I think fans will remember Ragan from last year as a low end guy who occasionally races well. He’s no longer on the dismantled Michael Waltrip Racing team, and now belongs to BK Racing. He went from being Clint Bowyer’s team mate to Matt DiBenedetto’s and Robert Richardson’s, which is a huge downgrade. Based on his practice times he’s got a pretty slow car.

Check the Slack channel for a cheat sheet with info, stats, and projections.