The NASCAR Cup Series heads to Martinsville Speedway for Sunday's Cook Out 400 (3:30 PM ET, FS1).
Martinsville is a half-mile paper clip-shaped track where mechanical grip, driver technique, track position, pit stops, and tire management all come together to create a unique style of racing unlike anywhere else the Cup Series races.
Since the track is just over a half mile long, some drivers made more than 60-lap runs in practice, which gives us plenty of data to see who shone in all aspects of practice.
My practice FLAGS metrics proved to be highly successful last week, guiding me to an elite daily fantasy lineup that qualified me for the Fantasy Racing World Championship, netted one FantasyLabs subscriber over $40k, and led to my Carson Hocevar betting ladder, which pushed me over 300 units won all-time in the Action App.
This week's practice FLAGS should still be quite important, but with a premium on track position, there's also going to be a heavy emphasis on pit crews, starting position, and driver quality at the track itself in past races.
Putting it altogether, my model has found a couple of values, leading me to my Cook Out 400 Best Bets for Martinsville.
NASCAR at Martinsville Best Bets
*Odds as of Saturday evening
Joey Logano
Logano was fantastic on the long run with very little tire degradation.
In fact, if we plot him against the other top-six drivers in group-adjusted speed FLAGS, it's clear he had the lowest tire degradation (flattest line in the latter half of the run), and he ranked second in overall long-run speed behind Kyle Larson.
Logano (in the blue curve above) fired off relatively slowly, so he won't pop near the top of the shorter-segment lap times (30 laps or less), which is probably what's making him a bit undervalued in the market.
But over the course of a full tire run, he might arguably have the best car, with clearly faster group-adjusted lap times than anyone else after around lap 45.
Give me all his upside markets.
At the time of writing, FanDuel has the best price on each, at 14-1 to win, +440 for a top-three finish, +190 for a top-five finish, and +380 to finish as the top Ford driver.
The Bet: Joey Logano Ladder
- Win (Bet to +1000)
- T3 (Bet to +300)
- T5 (Bet to +150)
- Top Ford (Bet to +300)
