NASCAR DFS Playbook: Wawa 250

Previewing Daytona or Talladega is never easy. Truth be told, superspeedway races are my least favorite for DFS. I like it from the standpoint that my bankroll doesn’t take a heavy hit. Typically, I’ll play about $60-$80 for each Truck and Xfinity slate and then for Cup I’ll throw a couple hundred down. I typically make 20-40 lineups for each race. For superspeedways? I make three lineups and never play more than $50. That’s just me. These races are phenomenal to be at in person, but on TV pack racing isn’t the sexiest thing to watch until everyone starts wrecking. The television product doesn’t quite do it justice. Cars going around a track at 200+ mph is truly awesome in person. While I will preview drivers I like below, just because certain drivers don’t make the Playbook doesn’t mean I wouldn’t play them. There are drivers and cars that are better at these tracks and you could simply stack the back of the field and leave $10,000+ on the table on DraftKings for cash games. But you also need your drivers to avoid the wrecks. Your DFS day could be ruined by one of these…

They call those “The Big One,” and there’s always a good chance we see one or two each year. And with this being one of the final regular season races, you’ll see many desperate drivers attempt to be aggressive and make a move to win the race to earn their playoff spot. In Cash games you can target PD this week. In GPP’s targeting PD and maybe one or two guys starting closer to the front is always a smart strategy. So, with that said, play it smart this week. Personally, I’ll be playing the $3 three-entry max contest, the Happy Hour, and maybe throw my three builds into the King of the Speedway qualifier for the Cup series race. Be smart this week and let’s do our best to get in victory lane!

The Xfinity series race is only scheduled for 100 laps (broken into 30-30-40 segments) so that only leaves 70 dominator points on the table. Not great. And when we account for cautions (and there could be many with wrecks) we might be looking at 60 dominator points, plus there’s a competition caution following lap 15. So while an argument could be made for every driver this weekend, here are the drivers to look at based on track history and/or position differential!

Driver Pool 

Chase Briscoe ($11,500; Starting P37) This is good chalk for Friday’s race. Briscoe is an experienced Cup driver who was one of the favorites to win the Xfinity series championship last season. He’s starting pretty far back and is safe for both Cash and GPP contests. I’m not too worried about the equipment given that we’re at Daytona. A top 12 basically returns 5X value, but there’s a good chance we get a top five-to-ten finish if he avoids the carnage. In both races at Daytona in 2020, he grabbed a pair of top fives in this series.

Daniel Hemric ($10,700; Starting P21) Hemric’s still searching for that first win and this is arguably the best equipment he’s ever been in. He grabbed a top ten here back in February and he finished 12th at Talladega but he was regularly up front in that race. He comes with PD although he is starting in the middle of the pack. I’m curious if the Xfinity JGR drivers will drop to the rear since that’s a tried-and-true method of the Cup series team. Either way, I like Hemric for a strong finish this week if he stays clean.

Brandon Brown ($10,100; Starting P31) Brown and Briscoe will be very popular as they’re starting outside the top 30. If you read my Best Bets article for Friday’s race you’ll know I’m pretty excited about Brown. He has back-to-back top tens at ‘Dega and he’s never finished worse than 15th. At Daytona he has three finishes in the top seven in his last four races. Now, a good portion of that is good fortune to avoid wrecking on a consistent basis. He’s not immune, but he’s a great play this weekend.

Jeb Burton ($9,400; Starting P13) I’m a little thrown off by the price. I get that Burton offers some PD, but I thought he would be just a little bit cheaper. Regardless, he’s an upside GPP play. He won Talladega earlier this year to qualify for the postseason and he finished fourth at Daytona back in February. Even in the February 2020 Daytona race, Burton managed to get out front when he was part-time with JR Motorsports and lead 26 laps. He wrecked toward the end unfortunately, but there’s no denying his plate racing abilities.

JJ Yeley ($9,200; Starting P34) Yeley’s a constant PD target when he’s competing in the Xfinity series. He always starts outside the top 30 and can gain anywhere from 10-to-20 spots come race’s end. Daytona and Talladega are some of his better tracks if you look strictly at his Driver Averages profile. However, he’s only run one superspeedway race over the last three seasons. Luckily he finished 12th in that race back in February when the season kicked off at Daytona. I don’t consider him as much of a lock as I do Briscoe or Brown, but Yeley’s still a fine play this week.

Christopher Bell ($8,900; Starting P15) I don’t think he wins, but he’s still a great DFS play. He just needs to finish seventh for 5X value so it seems absurd that he’s this cheap. He’s in the 54-car for JGR which has been phenomenal this season, as he grabbed a win in this ride at New Hampshire. At the Xfinity series, he finished third and 12th at Talladega and rattled off three straight top six finishes in his last three Daytona races. If he runs clean, this is another fine play.

Austin Cindric ($8,800; Starting P14) He’s $100 cheaper than Bell starting just one spot ahead of him. He won at Daytona back in February to kick the season off and he has four top tens in his last five races at Daytona. Team Penske is known for having great superspeedway cars and Cindric’s proven he can win at this style of track so I don’t quite understand why he’s so cheap. Similar to Bell, he needs a top seven finish to hit 5X value.

Justin Haley ($8,600; Starting P9) Haley deserves acknowledgement anytime there is a superspeedway race. He swept the Talladega races in 2020, won this very race a year ago, and in 2019 he won the Coke Zero 400 at the Cup level. The starting spot relegates him mostly to GPP’s, which is fine. I do like targeting PD for some of my GPP builds while throwing in a driver starting in the top ten. Haley’s track record and ability to get to the front make him a solid play, but he could still carry a bit of ownership in GPP’s since the secret’s out regarding his level of success on these tracks.

A.J. Allmendinger ($7,700; Starting P1) Dinger on the pole could draw ownership down a bit. Honestly, I won’t play him but he is one of the favorites to win Friday’s race. He’s on a roll with a Cup series win at Indy and he won last week’s Xfinity race in Michigan. Plus, Xfinity Racing had to go and drop this little nugget…

If you’re superstitious then get exposure. He finished fifth here in February’s race and he led 58 laps in last year’s race before a late wreck forced him to finish 15th. Plus, he finished third at Talladega back in April. Kaulig knows how to set their cars up for success here.

Jordan Anderson ($7,200; Starting P18) If you want a low-owned play that you can try to talk yourself into then Anderson is a driver you could consider. He’s making his Xfinity series debut at a superspeedway but he does have plenty of Truck series experience. In the last two Truck series races at Daytona he’s surprisingly finished as the runner-up and he finished sixth last year at Talladega in the Truck series. He has struggled a bit in his own car this year, but he did finish 15th at Michigan last week. If you want to take down a massive GPP, you have to take some chances and Anderson epitomizes that kind of gamble.

Colby Howard ($6,300; Starting P33) JD Motorsports does a pretty good job prepping their cars for superspeedway races. With Howard starting outside the top 30, and coming in with some good momentum for his standards, I like him this week. He finished 12th here a year ago but did wreck out of February’s race (again, no one is safe). He started P37 at Talladega in April and finished in the top 20 so there’s certainly a chance he moves up here. 

David Starr ($6,500; Starting P32) Starr is in the 61-car for Hattori Racing Enterprises/MBM. I honestly don’t know the logistics of these two teams, but this car is the one I’d prefer he be in over the 13-and-66-cars. Could he still have equipment issues? Sure, but Starr finished 16th in this ride at Talladega and while he didn’t race Daytona in February, he has plenty of top 20 finishes in worse equipment at superspeedways.

Joe Graf Jr. ($6,100; Starting P39) Graf is a guy I like this week. If I was doing my normal 20 lineups for this series, he’d make probably five or six of them. He’s a great value play and can’t kill you too much in terms of negative PD since he’s already starting in the back row. In this same car back in February he finished 11th, but in four races at Daytona he’s wrecked three times so keep that in mind. The chance of a DNF does seem slightly higher with Graf, but even a top 20 finish would return roughly 7X value.

Spencer Boyd ($5,300; Starting P38) Boyd has run in two races at Daytona and has moved up at least nine spots per race finishing 17th and 25th. However, those races were three years ago. He’s only run one race this season, which came at New Hampshire and he finished 33rd. But anything can happen. I don’t care if he’s well off the pace and running laps on his own. Wrecks could pave the way for him to finish in the top 25 once again. Spread exposure out evenly among the value tier because like Starr, this ride could have issues. You don’t want to be too heavy on any particular driver in this range.

Core Drivers