What a wild Saturday. Before we get into Cup stuff, I wanted to talk for a minute about contest selection. Saturday's Xfinity contests had a great example to help understand why what contests you enter might be even more important then what lineup you use.

• DK user Felixingenium entered a lineup that scored 302.75 points. Let's look how that did in three different GPP contests.
  • In the $125k Piston, which allows up to 150 entries per person, and costs $10 to enter, the lineup finished in 119th place and returned $60, for a net gain of $50. Not bad.
  • In the $10l Pitstop, which allows up to 10 entries per person, and costs $33 to enter, the very same lineup finished 3rd and returned $500, for a net gain of $467. An awesome day.
  • In the $25k Spotter, which allows up to 4 entries per person, and costs $180 to enter, the very same lineup finished 1st and returned $5,000, for a net gain of $4,820. Now we're really talking.
  • I know not everyone will ever be comfortable playing in the higher entry fee contests. But, time after time, the same lineup will win a whole lot more in those contests then it will in the much larger, cheaper contests. Even if that style of play isn't available to you now, please keep all this in mind as a goal out there as you progress in DFS.

Now onto Cup stuff. I've got to think cash lineups are going to be so chalky with a host of good cars starting in the back due to numerous practice and qualifying issues. I really can't argue against playing any of the five guys who will be scored in the 30s - Almirola, Harvick, Chastain, Wallace and Kurt Busch. Kurt will have to do a drive through penalty, but with the number of expected cautions on Sunday, it's pretty likely he can get a lap back even if he does fall off the lead lap serving the penalty. You could conceivably use all five and then pick your favorite with the remaining salary.

• The other potential strategy would be to use four of them with Kyle Larson and then another salary fill in for the last spot. 
• I don't really have more to say about Sunday. The approach is really straight forward and a lot is really unknown, so I hate to overanalyze it when we really don't have relevant data to do so.

A couple of bets I like:

• Cindric +130 Briscoe
• Wallace +115 Burton
• Stenhouse +125 Burton
• Bowman +225 Top 5 finish

SATURDAY UPDATE -- There are a ton of good position difference plays in the mid tier today. The question you need to ask is who do you trust? Guys like Myatt Snider, Anthony Alfredo and Jeffrey Earnhardt have a good floor and upside because of their starting spot. But do you trust them? Or would you rather take a little less scoring floor and upside with guys like Tommy Joe Martins, Kaz Grala, Jeb Burton and Brett Moffitt. This early in the season with such a short practice, I'm leaning toward the second group. I'll take the risk of fading that first group with eyes wide open that it might burn me because I trust the second group more. (Also, Timmy Hill is out and will not race. It's ridiculous that Graf bought out the ride after missing the race in qualifying.)

Same day qualifying makes it so hard to narrow down the target list in advance. I'll try to add a quick note after qualifying on Saturday. Here's the best I can do for now:

• Ty Gibbs - This #54 car was just amazing at intermediate tracks last year. Should be really fast and a potential dominator.
• Noah Gragson - Gragson is usually right up there on these worn out surfaces that have high tire wear.
• Justin Allgaier - If in doubt, it might make sense to fall back on a reliable veteran like Allgaier. He's got plenty of track experience here and won two races on high tire wear tracks last year (Atlanta and Darlington).
• Allmendinger, Hemric and Cassill - Generally speaking, the Kauling cars have not been great at high tire wear tracks. Cassill could be a good sub-$9k play depending on starting spot. I'd be surprised to see a dominator from this team.
• Cole Custer - Experienced here and a car put together by the Stewart Haas.
• Brandon Jones, Trevor Bayne and Sam Mayer - All at reasonable prices in top level cars. I'd jump on any of them if they drop at all in qualifying. (Jones led a bunch of laps and probably should have won the last Auto Club race two years ago.)
• Austin Hill - Just way too cheap in a RCR car. Even without the price difference, I'd prefer Hill over Sheldon Creed in what should be nearly identical race cars.
• Brett Moffitt down to Tommy Joe Martins - I would have no problem using any of the drivers in this price range depending on qualifying spot. They all should have reliable cars and are decent drivers. (Note: While it's a small sample size of six races, Brandon Brown was terrible at high tire wear tracks last year, finishing 24th or worse in all six races. On the flip side, Jeremy Clements finished 12th or better in all six of those races. Clements needs a strong finish here after getting wrecked out at Daytona and finishing near dead last.)
• Timmy Hill - He's in a Ryan Sieg car this week which is way better then his normal Xfinity ride at MBM. A primary target for me depending on starting spot.
• Mason Massey - Although it's always risky to dig this deep, Massey could be a decent punt play. The DGR cars tend to about 20th place cars and pretty reliable. He's really cheap so if finishing 20th-25th gives him position difference upside, then I could see going for it.

Bets

• Noah Gragson -130 Top 5 finish
• Cole Custer +250 Top 5 finish
• Timmy Hill +5000 Top 5 finish - not going to happen, but at this long of odds, worth a few bucks

Reminder - I won't be posting anything for the Duels. My stuff will start with Trucks on Friday.

Trucks Series Notes posted below Thursday Night - Friday Update Posted Below
Xfinity Series Notes coming soon - Friday Night Update Posted Below - Post Qual Notes Below
Cup Series Notes posted below Friday Morning

Time to get back to work. All three series are in action this weekend and I'll keep updating this post as necessary until The 500 begins. We'll start with some general comments about my approach for Daytona--

• Don't overdo it. We all know the superspeedway races are the most unpredictable races of the year. Sometimes half the field or more wrecks out. These races are unlike what we see most weeks and it virtually eliminates the edge that knowledgeable NASCAR fanatics like us have on the field in DFS contests. Play. Have fun. But the season is really long with 70+ events between all three series. We'll have an edge for most of those events, so let's focus there and not on these first three wildcard races. Personally, at superspeedways, I play about 30%-50% of what I budget as my normal weekly amount. It's tough to hold back in this first weekend back, but it's the right move.
• Using guys starting in the back is the right general rule of thumb. But dig a little deeper. We want the guys that not only start in the back, but that also tend to run in the back for at least the first half of the race. We don't want the guys in the Trucks Series who will be battling two and three wide trying to get stage points on Lap 20. We much prefer the guys who are content to run behind the lead pack and let a couple wrecks happen to thin the field in front of them. (More on this when I identify a few specific drivers I like in each series.)
• Don't worry about leaving a lot of salary on the table this week. It really doesn't matter how much you do leave on the table. Never pay for the expensive guys starting near the front at a superspeedway.
• Some of the betting lines this week are just nuts. We've got some sites posting -1000 or shorter odds on 5+ drivers to finish in the Top 20. A driver would need a 90%+ chance of finishing in the Top 20 to make that bet make sense. But no one has a 90%+ chance of even finishing the race, let alone finishing in the Top 20. As with DFS, be real careful betting on superspeedway races. If I do make any bets this week, it will very likely be at +100 or longer odds.

I'll add comments below for each Series after salaries come out and we see some more practice and qualifying runs.

Trucks Series (Friday) -- will update if possible after qualifying

• The Trucks Series races tend to be absolutely crazy because you have a lot of young, inexperienced superspeedway drivers combined with a lot of questionable equipment out there.
  • The last two Daytona races, 31% of the field has wrecked out completely and only 56% of the field finished on the lead lap. Three years ago at Daytona, 72% of the field wrecked out completely.
• For cash games, I'll be targeting guys on smaller teams that I expect to qualify near the back and stay in the back during the race and let the chaos unfold in front of them. My main targets include:
  • Timmy Hill - Family owned
  • Jess Little, Spencer Boyd and Danny Bohn - Young's Motorsports
  • Tate Fogleman - On Point
  • Jordan Anderson - Family owned
  • Kris Wright and Lawless Alan - Niece Motorsports
  • Jason White, Thad Moffitt - Reaume
• Obviously, if someone from a bigger team qualifies poorly, you play them too.
• FRIDAY UPDATE --  Going to be really chalky: 
  • Rhodes, Crafton, Klingerman all OK now with bad starting spots
  • Timmy Hill doing an engine change, so a little worried about that, but love the driver and starting spot, so still in play
  • Bohn, Fogleman, White, Moffitt all good to go - preferred in that order
  • Little, Boyd, Wright and Alan not good any longer because starting too far forward
  • Anderson did not make the race

Xfinity Series (Saturday)

• Looking at basically the same strategy as Trucks. Bigger teams who totally miss in qualifying and smaller teams starting in the back who will run in the back for a good chunk of the race. Here are the main targets:
  • JD Motorsports - Bayley Currey and Ryan Vargas
  • DGM - Alex Labbe, Mason Massey, Kyle Weatherman and Josh Bilicki
  • BJ McLeod - Josh Williams, Stephan Parsons and Matt Mills
  • Alpha Prime - Tommy Joe Martins
  • SS Green Light - David Starr and Joe Graf Jr
  • Emerling Gase - Joey Gase and Shane Lee
  • I also think JJ Yeley and Ronnie Bassett would run in the back if they make the race, but these cars also have the most question marks about reliability and speed
• Post Qualifying 
  • Sam Meyer obviously an add and good play
  • Jeremy Clements a strong add as well. Good plate track guy
  • Tommy Joe Martins and Shane Lee from list above look good
  • Josh Bilicki, Ryan Truex and Myatt Snider all good plays
  • Fading Kyle Sieg -- too young and inexperienced compared to alternatives
  • Cassill, Hill and Creed all +1600 to win

Cup Series (Sunday)

• With the starting lineup set, my initial reaction is to just sit out cash games this week because there will be so much chalk. Almost everyone will play Denny Hamlin, Austin Dillon, Aric Almirola and Noah Gragson. Most will complete their lineup with some combination of Cole Custer, Daniel Hemric and David Ragan. Everything is going to come down to one or two drivers and lineup spots at most. And there's just no way to gain an edge in those spots. It's all about who gets caught in a wreck and/or finishes a few spots higher in the end.
• My current plan is to play out the tickets I have in the Million Dollar contest on DK and maybe play a few tournaments just for fun. I'll probably do a few cash games just to get ownership numbers, but at 10% or so of the normal budget.