Welcome everyone to the Complete NASCAR DFS Preview for DraftKings and FanDuel: For this edition, we will take a quick look at the upcoming Cup Series, Xfinity Series, Truck Series races at Texas. This article is brought to you by DFSArmy.com and written by Ryan Larkin. You can catch up with Ryan on Twitter or in the DFSA VIP slack @Larkin8
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May 18, 2019; Concord, NC, USA; NASCAR Cup Series driver Kyle Larson (42) celebrates after winning the Monster Energy All-Star Race at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Mandatory Credit: Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports
Texas Motor Speedway
All three of the top NASCAR series will be at Texas Motor Speedway this week. We will have a Saturday doubleheader for the Truck and Xfinity Series followed by the 2021 All-Star race on Sunday. Texas is a 1.5-mile high-speed intermediate track. It was recently repaved in 2017 with a complete reconstruction of turns 1 and 2. Since this time the track has become incredibly hard to drive but more importantly incredibly hard to pass on. Track position is everything. We saw this last year with Austin Dillon taking two tires and leading the last 25 or so laps with about a 15th place car. The lack of downforce in the Truck and Xifinty Series makes this track one of the most difficult to drive. Both series have seen a large increase in the amount of cautions per race since the 2017 repave. These races have probably the highest variance level of any intermediate track due to no tire wear and pit strategy plus the abnormally high caution and DNF counts.
Cup Series Quick Race Facts
Cup Series
Date: June 13th
All Star open 6:00 pm ET.
Laps: 50
Stages: 20/20/10 = 50 total laps
All Star race 8:00 pm ET.
Laps: 90
Stages: 15/15/15/15/30/10 = 90 laps
Cup Series DFS Outlook
This weekend will be a very interesting one. We will have a total of 21 drivers in the All Star race. 17 who are already locked in, followed by 3 stage winners from the All Star Open and finally a driver who wins the fan vote. We will not know the true finally starting order and entries for the All Star race until about 45 minutes or so before lock. Dominators are going to be borderline nonexistent. After each stage the lineup will be inverted which will give a different driver the opportunity to lead for a short period of time. Because of this we can not base anything off of a dominator. We will be looking to play the best place diff potential plays and maybe a top finisher or two. The last wrinkle for this race is that teams will only have 510 hp. This will keep the field tighter and should set up for more pack style racing. This is likely to cause a big wreck just like it did a few years back at Charlotte when NASCAR used ultra low HP. This race has the potential to be a mess.
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Xfinity Series Quick Race Facts
Xfinity Series
Date: June 12th
Race: Saturday 4:00 pm ET.
Laps: 167
Stages: 40/80/167
Xfinity Series DFS Outlook
For the first time at Texas the Xfinity Series will run 250 miles instead of the normal 300. The biggest impact is this will shorten the race by 33 laps giving us less potential dominator points. Also, this will shorten the stage lengths which could keep a couple more drivers on the lead lap. Kyle Busch will run in the 54 this week. There are plenty of cheap plays that you can pair with him to offset his huge price. If you believe he will be the main dominator then I would recommend playing a lot of him. Otherwise, there are a ton of great place differential options. Gragson and Berry will uber chalk. This race should be very chalky at the top so it will be important to find ways to differentiate your lineups in the lower tier. My biggestest concern is this race becomes a wreckfest like Charlotte was two weeks ago.
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Truck Series Quick Race Facts
Date: June 12th
Race: Saturday 1:00 pm ET.
Laps: 147
Stages: 35/70/147
Truck Series DFS Outlook
Holy Chase Elliott. Chase is essentially a free square. We saw him absolutely torch the truck series with GMS last year and we should expect the same this year. He offers tons of place differential points and then has that whole dominator potential. Chase also costs about $3000 less than he should. He is a no brainer. You can get a few lineups without him and play the other great place diff guys like Enfinger, Chastain, Creed, and Chalk Josh Berry. The field is extremely sketchy under $7,000 which is going to make certain drivers chalk out of necessity. However, at a track with a high DNF rate we could see a shocker like McGee on the optimal. To give you an idea of what I am referring to, Jen Jo Cobb has finishes of 18th, 18th, and 24th in 3 of the last 4 Texas races… EVERYONE is viable. Do not be afraid to punt a spot in order to maximize the other 5 spots.
This will conclude this edition of our NASCAR Preview. If you would like to reach out and talk NASCAR Follow me on Twitter @Larkin8 or of course Become a VIP member and join me as well as our other DFS Army NASCAR contributors (Brady Miller and Taco) in the NASCAR coaching channels.