The Cup Series Chase reaches the halfway point this week with our second straight race sponsored by a casino.
This one is the South Point Hotel, Casino, & Spa. The South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway is the fifth of 10 Cup Series Chase playoff races.
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It will be a very bittersweet week as Las Vegas native Kyle Busch will be honored in various ways over the course of the week. Streets around Las Vegas Motor Speedway are being renamed and tears are sure to be shed. Rowdy Road and Busch Brothers Drive will be two streets around the venue moving forward.
The haulers are putting some miles on over the next few weeks, as the Cup Series goes from Las Vegas to Charlotte and then back to the desert for the second Phoenix stop of the season. This is the second stop in Vegas, with the Pennzoil 400 back in mid-March won by Denny Hamlin.
All 16 drivers who qualified for the Cup Series Chase will be in the running to win the championship for the duration of the postseason. The point totals were reset based on a new format, ranging from 2,100 to 2,000.
Kyle Larson – 2282
Denny Hamlin – 2256
Christopher Bell – 2232
Joey Logano – 2215
Ryan Blaney – 2191
Ty Gibbs – 2188
Tyler Reddick – 2171
Chase Briscoe – 2159
Austin Cindric – 2142
Bubba Wallace – 2142
Carson Hocevar – 2132
William Byron – 2124
Chase Elliott – 2121
Ryan Preece – 2109
Chris Buescher – 2096
Daniel Suarez – 2095
Larson has saved his best racing for late in the season, as it was a clean sweep for him at Kansas. He won the race, won Stages 1 and 2, led the most laps, and had the fastest lap. He now has four top-five finishes in the Cup Series Chase and two victories. He didn’t win any regular-season races. Cindric made a nice move up the standings by finishing second, but Hamlin kept his grasp on second place by finishing third.
The race winners from the regular season were Reddick (5), Hamlin (4), Blaney (3), Chase Elliott (2), Shane van Gisbergen (2), Corey Heim (2), Gibbs (2), Logano (2), Suarez, Carson Hocevar, Briscoe, and Preece. Preece’s win stole van Gisbergen’s playoff spot from him, as it came at just the right time.
After some unfortunate circumstances took away his chance to win at Bristol, Blaney picked up his second top-five finish of the Chase, moving past Gibbs for fifth.
As far as this race, this is a twice-a-year stop, so we have a lot of data points. Hamlin’s win in the spring was his third in the last 10 races to go along with one additional top-five finish and seven total top-10 finishes. This might be a week for Larson to stay hot, as he’s accumulated 437 points over the last 10 races in Vegas, including two wins, five top-five finishes, and eight top-10 finishes. Joey Logano is the only other driver with multiple wins over this span.
Byron does have a win to go with five top-five finishes here and seven top-10 finishes over his last 10 starts, so we’ll see if maybe he can make a move up the board. For long shots, Alex Bowman has a win here recently and Ross Chastain has five top-five finishes and six top-10 results.
For the latest odds and VSiN’s NASCAR Best Bets, head to our NASCAR Hub to see Steve Makinen’s simulation results and more stats on the drivers at VSIN.com