NASCAR Betting Guide: All-Star Race

The last time the NASCAR Cup Series ran a race in North Wilkesboro was a year before William Byron -- last week's winner -- was born. It has been a hot second. None of the current Cup Series drivers have run a race there in a Cup car.

Despite that -- and despite this being the sport's All-Star Race -- I think we can model it with decent confidence.

We know the key characteristics of the track: it's short with minimal banking and massive tire falloff. In general, we know which drivers will excel on those track types.

Additionally, the format of the race is straightforward. Outside of a pit crew competition setting the order to Saturday's heat races, everything else is simple. They'll have a heat race to make up ground should the crew make an error, and then the main event is just 200 laps with no inversions or anything funky like that.

Bookmakers, though, seem to be baking in extra uncertainty. And I don't blame them. There are plenty of unknowns here.

Personally, I'd like to take advantage of that modeled uncertainty. It has left a couple of drivers undervalued by my model, and I'd like to add them to my betslip now before cars are on track in case those numbers shorten.

Let's dig into those now, based on FanDuel Sportsbook's NASCAR betting odds, and we can circle back later in the weekend if more value arises.

Kyle Larson to Win (+700)

As of Wednesday night, one of the biggest values in my model was the aforementioned Byron. He was +1000 at FanDuel, putting his implied odds at 9.1%. I had him at 11.2%, so I was willing to bite.

Someone else apparently was, too, as Byron's odds have since shortened to +750. With implied odds of 11.8%, he's off the menu, at least for the time being.

To make room for Byron's shortening, FanDuel lengthened the odds on two drivers whose tangle last week led to Byron's win: Kyle Larson and Ross Chastain. I show good value in both. We'll touch on Chastain in a second, but let's start with Larson.

Larson's dirt-racing background should translate well to North Wilkesboro. Most of his best tracks in the Cup Series -- Homestead, Darlington, Richmond -- are places that feature massive tire falloff. When things get slick, Larson rises. We'll see that here.

Larson's betting odds have hovered between +450 and +600 the past few weeks. So once you account for the smaller field size this weekend, we're definitely getting him at a discount, meaning the uncertainty is baked into the market.

My model has Larson at 14.2% to win, up from 12.5% implied. There's a chance he could lengthen should something happen in the pit-crew competition, but I don't want to take that risk. I want to lock him in at this price now.

Ross Chastain to Win (+1400)

It has been more than a calendar year since Chastain has won a Cup race. He has never won one on a non-drafting oval. So being high on him in the All-Star Race may feel odd.

But he's so consistently at the front that the model has no choice but to love him.

In three races on tracks with huge tire falloff this year -- Fontana, Richmond, and Darlington -- Chastain's average running positions are third, fifth, and fourth, respectively. We saw glimpses of this even when he was with Chip Ganassi Racing as he finished third at Darlington in the fall of 2021, at the time the second-best finish of his career.

You'd think that with Chastain's aggressive driving style, he'd struggle at places with falloff. That just hasn't been the case.

My model has Chastain's win odds at 10.5%, up from 6.7% implied. You could say that his inability to close out wins means we should avoid him. The flip side is that he's flirting with a breakout and could experience positive regression soon. I'm leaning toward the latter, making Chastain a good bet for Sunday night.