NASCAR TOYOTA OWNERS 400 ANALYSIS
We’ve got some more NASCAR short track racing from Virginia on Sunday afternoon with the Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond Raceway’s ¾-mile flat D-shaped oval.
It races like a 1.5-mile speedway, but has all the bump and grind of short track racing that we all love.
TOYOTA OWNERS 400 BETTING RESOURCES
- Date: Sunday, April 18, 2021
- TV-Time: FOX, 3:00 p.m. ET
- Venue: Richmond Raceway
- Location: Richmond, Virginia
Last week the series was at Martinsville’s half-mile flat paperclip layout won by Martin Truex Jr. -- the 7/2 favorite -- for his second win of the season.
He’s the first driver to capture two wins after eight races. More importantly, his two wins came with the 750 horsepower package, and even more importantly for this week, those wins were at the flat tracks of Phoenix and Martinsville.
Those two serve as the perfect barometer to help in this week’s wagering strategies.
When I first started creating NASCAR odds in the early 90s, an easy trick I used always worked when setting numbers for Phoenix, Richmond, and New Hampshire.
I saw where a few crew chiefs said they used the same chassis for all three tracks, or at least two of them, so what I did was basically use the results from one of those races to make the odds for the next.
It seemed like every year a driver would win on two of the three flat tracks similar in distance. Rusty Wallace, Terry Labonte, Davey Allison, Jeff Burton, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kurt Busch, Kyle Busch, and Kevin Harvick all had super seasons at those three tracks.
If they did well on one, they did well on the others.
TOYOTA OWNERS 400 CONTENDERS
- Martin Truex Jr. +400
- Brad Keselowski +600
- Denny Hamlin +650
- Joey Logano +750
- Kyle Busch +800
- Chase Elliott +850
- More NASCAR Futures
- (Odds Subject to Change)
So it would make sense for this week that we review what happened at Phoenix Raceway on March 14 which displayed a few 'haves' and many more 'have-nots'.
Nine drivers that finished in the top-10 of Stage 1 finished in the top-10 of the race. Nine drivers that finished in the top-10 of stage 2 finished in the top-10 of the final results. There were 22 lead changes among nine drivers and seven cautions.
I remember it as an entertaining race with Joey Logano having the best car but Truex improving on each pit stop. Logano led a race-high 143 laps and gave up the lead for good with 24 laps to go. Truex would lead 64 laps, Ryan Blaney led 35 laps, and Denny Hamlin led 33 laps.
Joey Logano and the No. 22 team are expected to be contenders on Sunday when the NASCAR Cup Series heads to Richmond. (AP)
The Phoenix finishers were heavy hitters with Truex, Logano runner-up, Hamlin third again, with Brad Keselowski and Chase Elliott rounding out the top-five. Hamlin has finished third in all four races using the 750 HP package and has seven top-fives in the eight races on the season. He’s my choice to win this week.
“We can win any given week,” Hamlin said. “We just keep getting beat by one or two cars that have a little bit better balance. But we’re getting closer. There’s nothing saying we can’t win the next three races.”
HANDICAPPING NASCAR AT RICHMOND
HOMETOWN HERO?
Hamlin gets some home cooking this week as Richmond Raceway is 25 minutes from where he grew up in Chesterfield.
“It’s always great getting to race at my hometown track,” he said. “I’ve been fortunate to have had success at Richmond in my career, and I know my team and I are excited for the challenge ahead this weekend to hopefully get a win.”
The best price I’ve seen on Hamlin this week is +555 at Circa Sports while William Hill is offering 5/1 odds.
In 28 Richmond starts, he leads all active drivers with 1,704 laps led. He also has three wins, 13 top-fives, and averaged a 9th-place finish. His last win came from the pole in the 2016 fall race. He had seven wins last season, but none through the first eight races. He’ll be more aggressive this week and not let the win slip away as he has a few times already this season. Or at least that’s how I feel about it.
JGR + RICHMOND = SUCCESS
Hamlin’s teammate Kyle Busch is the best active driver at Richmond, or at least his stats say so. In 30 starts, he has six wins, 18 top-fives, 23 top-10s, 1,488 laps led. I love his William Hill odds at 10/1, but he’s shown me nothing in 2020 or 2021 that he’s fast enough to win with this week’s package. All his Gibbs teammates have been much better with the package.
The actual best Richmond driver now is another Gibbs driver, Truex, who is being offered by Circa Sports at +465 odds. He’s led 106 laps or more in six of the last eight Richmond races. Five of those races ended in top-five finishes, two of them wins (2019). He was runner-up last season. He also won at Phoenix last month, perhaps the best barometer for predicting Richmond.
Two of those three Gibbs drivers don’t have a win yet, but the fourth driver Christopher Bell does. He won with this week’s race package at the Daytona road course, was ninth at Phoenix, and seventh last week at Martinsville. He’s got great stuff as his teammates do, but William Hill is offering him at 28/1 odds as if he doesn’t. He’s worth investing a few bucks to win this week based also on his three Richmond wins in the Xfinity Series.
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