Denny Hamlin earned his 61st career win this past Sunday at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, breaking his tie with Kevin Harvick for career wins. Hamlin had easily the best car and overcame an early speeding penalty to work his way through the field and get to the front. Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell contended early on. Even Chase Elliott made a good run late in the race. But Hamlin secured the win to grab back-to-back wins at Vegas.

This week we turn our attention to Darlington Raceway, the track with too many nicknames. This track is often known as The Egg, The Lady in Black, The Track Too Tough to Tame, etc. It’s certainly a unique track and Vegas served as a great segue to Darlington. Both tracks carry some similarities, but Darlington is a far more technical and challenging track.

We have all your coverage this weekend with the NASCAR DFS Playbook for DraftKings and FanDuel in addition to the NASCAR DFS Projections and the NASCAR DFS Ownership outlook. And after a year away, we’re bringing back the NASCAR DFS Show to offer up some analysis on every race in under 30 minutes each week. Let’s dive in and take a look at the top plays and lineup building strategies for the Goodyear 400!

 

 

 

Darlington Raceway

Darlington Raceway registers as another intermediate track with its own unique features. To start, it measures 1.366 miles in length with different turn radius at both ends of the track which contribute to its egg shape. The first two turns see 25 degrees of banking while the other end of the track is banked at 23 degrees. Tire wear is once again the name of the game, even more so than last week. Darlington and Homestead are the two tracks that eat tires up the most.

We’re going to see a lot of fall off and the drivers have been vocal about this race turning into a mess. We’re getting more horsepower in this package, less downforce, a smaller spoiler, and less diffuser under the car. Denny Hamlin has been at the forefront the last couple weeks that this race could be a disaster. For that reason, I’d almost prefer to bet on this race than play DFS. But ever fret, I’ll still get my fix on DraftKings.

You’ll see from the trends table above that the last four winners here have started either P2 or P3 and one driver has led 100+ laps in each of those races. So the optimal lineup build was mostly a primary dominator with a secondary option as well that maybe leads 20+ laps and collects fastest laps while still scoring well. But we remain flexible given that the aero packages for those races was different than what we’ll see for Sunday’s race. But over the last five races nearly 93% of the laps led came from drivers starting in the top 10.

 

 

 

NASCAR DraftKings and FanDuel Scoring Trends

As we noted in the previous section, the first two rows are where we may find a lot of win equity. For this race on Sunday we’re going to see the likes of Tyler Reddick, Bubba Wallace, Chase Elliott, and Kyle Larson start in the first two rows. There’s clear win equity there and we’ll want to spread exposure around because the best scores tend to come from P1, P2, and P4. We’ll give P30 an honorable mention because apparently that’s the lucky PD spot (best of luck to Noah Gragson on Sunday).

But let’s not forget the trends table, however. There are a lot of laps in this race. But strangely enough, we don’t need to lock ourselves into a multi-dominator build. In each of the last four races, there’s been one driver to lead over 100 laps and nobody else led over 50. So I’ll be mixing in some solo dominator builds (with Reddick, Bubba, and Larson) while also building out some two-dominator lineups as well. 

 

 

 

NASCAR DFS Picks & Strategy: Goodyear 400

 

NASCAR Goodyear 400 Top Tier DFS Picks

Denny Hamlin (Starting P9) – DraftKings: $11,000 | FanDuel: $14,000

If we’re looking at track history it’s awfully hard to pass on last week’s winner, Denny Hamlin. The Toyota camp has looked pretty strong so far this year by winning four of the first five races and Hamlin went to victory lane a week ago at Vegas, which I think serves as a nice intro to Darlington Raceway for the Goodyear 400.

Hamlin won this race a year ago despite only leading 10 laps, but he’s also finished seventh or better in each of the last four Darlington races. In 27 races at Darlington over his decorated career he has five wins and 14 top five finishes. That’s right. He’s finishing in the top five in over half his races at this track.

Now to be fair, we need to be mindful that the entire field is sharing concerns about tire wear due to the aero package and more horsepower. So as good as Hamlin has been here, we do need to proceed with a little caution and aim to be responsible with our exposure.

Chase Briscoe (Starting P23) – DraftKings: $10,700 | FanDuel: $13,000

Chase Briscoe is a great option to potentially win this race. He did open with pretty solid odds on DraftKings to win outright (+850) but I found that difficult to bet. So I posted in Discord earlier this week that I took Joe Gibbs Racing to win the race (+185) and Chase Briscoe as the top Toyota (+380). So if Briscoe does win the race, I can cash both tickets.

Briscoe has won the last two summer races at Darlington and he flat out spanked the field over Labor Day Weekend last year when he led 309 laps on his way to victory lane. He was able to secure a perfect 150.0 driver rating for that race.

Briscoe spent about half of last week’s race at Vegas a lap down but when he got back on the lead lap, he was able to make some moves and gain track position in a race without many cautions. Overall, he finished eighth and there was great speed in the car which has been the case for the Toyota’s so far in 2026.

Kyle Larson (Starting P4) – DraftKings: $10,500 | FanDuel: $13,500

It feels odd to say it, but it feels like Larson could be slightly under-owned for this race. He starts P4 so he’s in position to emerge as a contender. And this is Darlington at the end of the day. In the playoff race in 2024 when he started P4 he led 263 laps and finished top five. And he won this race in the summer of 2023 after starting P18.

It’s a high tire wear track where successfully running the high line along the wall has its advantages. That’s Larson’s bread and butter. But it’s surprisingly been 10 months since his last race in a Cup Series race. And we’re talking about the defending Cup Series champion. The practice speed was not very good and we’re still a little unsure when the Chevy camp will figure out how to properly set up this new body. But I still can’t count a guy like Larson out at a track like this.

Tyler Reddick (Starting P1) – DraftKings: $9,500 | FanDuel: $12,500

Reddick has a soft price tag on DraftKings and he’s in position to absolutely spank the field. The car was so fast on Saturday during practice and qualifying. More importantly, it sustained good speed in the longer run. He was fastest in all the longer run metrics (15+ laps) and laid down a very fast lap despite slapping the wall on his qualifying run.

In eight races in the NextGen era, Reddick has five finishes of fourth or better including three(!) runner-up finishes. He led 42 laps in this race a year ago. Two years ago he started on the pole and led 174 laps. He certainly has the upside and track position to easily pay off this price tag so he’s going to be very difficult to not plug and play. 

 

 

 

NASCAR DFS Picks: Mid-Tier Drivers

Joey Logano (Starting P29) – DraftKings: $9,000 | FanDuel: $9,500

Logano isn’t a fantastic play by any means. In fact, his practice speeds were abhorrent. He was slow and didn’t even register a 20-lap run. But he also qualified poorly and starts P29. This is just the kind of play that can gradually move up through the field because he’s a three-time champ in the Cup Series and the car is still better than most of the field. The team can make adjustments and make the car better as the race progresses.

Logano won this race four years ago in the first year of the NextGen era. However, over the last three years (six races) at Darlington, he has an average finish of 15.3 so the practice struggles could be legitimate. But given where he’ll be starting for Sunday’s race, he only needs to finish top 15 (basically his average here in the last three years) with a handful of fastest laps to return value.

I would not fault anyone if they wanted to avoid this spot. Because this is a good driver to potentially fade because a $9K PD play with horrible practice speeds may not have much of a ceiling. Especially because you can spend $500 more for Reddick who could flat out crush this race.

Chris Buescher (Starting P6) – DraftKings: $8,300 | FanDuel: $8,000

Buescher is another driver I placed an early wager on this week (Top Ford +550) but again we’re treading carefully because Buescher echoed the same sentiment about this race that Hamlin has been sharing for weeks.

But Buescher still has solid track history at Darlington. He’s grabbed a top 10 in five of the last six Darlington races and he had good speed in the car at Vegas a week ago in a race where the Fords were almost an afterthought.

Buescher does have some win equity as he’s registered six career wins at the Cup level and RFK Racing is coming off a pretty impressive week where all three drivers finished in the top 12 at Vegas. Plus he starts P6 and based on the trends table above the last four winners started in the first two rows. Buescher starts in the third row so he’s still in the picture to an extent. This is not a cash game recommendation by any means. This is a GPP recommendation that won’t carry significant ownership.

Ty Gibbs (Starting P28) – DraftKings: $8,000 | FanDuel: $9,000

Ty Gibbs has been on one hell of a run and he seems to carry some extra motivation over the last month following the comments from Chris Gabehart in the ongoing lawsuit between Joe Gibbs Racing and Gabehart, who is now with Spire Motorsports.

Gibbs had a rough start to the season between Daytona and Atlanta. But over the last three races, Gibbs has grabbed three consecutive top five finishes. For our NASCAR DFS Goodyear 400 picks on Sunday, Gibbs offers a lot of position differential so he’s going to draw significant ownership.

His practice speeds were elite and second to arguably just Tyler Reddick. He wasn’t great in the shorter run, but his long run speed was well sustained. Gibbs ranked top five in the longer 20+ lap run metrics in practice. So we’re looking at a potential chalk bomb if something negative does happen to him but on paper he’s an outstanding play with momentum coming into Darlington.

 

 

 

NASCAR DFS Picks: Value Drivers

Erik Jones (Starting P24) – DraftKings: $7,500 | FanDuel: $7,000

Jones’ name will come up everywhere in DFS circles for this race. Darlington Raceway is one of his best tracks. Jones has won here twice: once with Jones Gibbs Racing and once with Petty GMS Motorsports which is now Legacy Motor Club.

Even last summer both Jones and teammate, John Hunter Nemechek, finished in the top five at this track. It was another night where the Toyota’s had everything dialed in and Legacy Motor Club appears to have made some strides and improvements in the offseason.

Obviously for a driver priced under $8,000 on both sites we have to like that we’re getting good track history and some win juice. He will be popular either way just because he has immense upside but he’s another driver you can look to bet either outright, top manufacturer, or for a top 10 finish.

AJ Allmendinger (Starting P27) – DraftKings: $6,100 | FanDuel: $5,200

I’m not completely sold on Allmendinger but I can certainly make an argument for him. Obviously he’s an affordable value play and we can squeeze some PD out of this recommendation. He’s an experienced driver who can manage his tires well. We just need him to stay on the lead lap and gradually move up throughout the race.

Dinger started P22 in both races last year at Darlington and he finished 18th in the spring and he was surprisingly top five over Labor Day Weekend. We should be concerned about the fact we have no idea how good this car is on the longer run and perhaps the starting spot is rather indicative of where this car likely runs. So I’m not going all in but he’s a veteran who can manage his tires and I think he’s worth throwing into some builds.

Todd Gilliland (Starting P31) – DraftKings: $5,500 | FanDuel: $4,500

I’m going to close out the value section with a pair of drivers who are both under $6K on DraftKings and under $5K on FanDuel. We start with Gilliland who is playable in all formats. He starts P31 and has top 20 upside even if he had a bad result a week ago at Vegas.

But a similar issue we run into with Gilliland, like we did with Allmendinger, is that we don’t know how good or bad the car is on the longer run. But I’m okay spreading exposure around in the value range because we expect this race to have a little more variance to it.

In eight career Cup Series races at Darlington, he’s finished 17th or better in five of them. We save a ton of money with Gilliland and he allows you to spend up for more expensive drivers. But I would cap exposure at roughly 25-30% because of some uncertainties with the car.

Austin Dillon (Starting P10) – DraftKings: $5,300 | FanDuel: $4,200

Dillon was a driver I quickly mentioned on the latest NASCAR DFS Show with Matt Selz this week. I’m not expecting great things by any means from Dillon but he’s coming into Darlington with three straight top 20 finishes and he gets priced down? And mind you, those top 20 finishes all came on a road course (COTA), a short track (Phoenix), and an intermediate tri-oval (Vegas).

Now is the track history at Darlington overall pretty decent for Dillon? Yes. Has it gotten a little bit worse during the NextGen era? Also yes! He only has two top 20 results and one top 15 in his last six races here. Prior to the NextGen era he was much better and arguably a consistent top 15 candidate.

But he’s riding some momentum and I think he’s worthy of taking a shot at this price especially in a race we could see tire wear and a little chaos. Dillon has strangely been very good having won at Richmond the last two years but his qualifying effort will relegate him to only GPP’s. But both he and teammate, Kyle Busch, qualified well for this race. So if there’s a chance he can hang in the top 10 and not losing any track position, we’re looking at a punt that has a path to being optimal in tournaments.

 

 

 

NASCAR DFS Optimizer & Lineups Picks This Week

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