NASCAR Odds, Predictions & Best Bets For This Weekend's Race
Our favorite drivers, odds and betting picks for the Wurth 400 at Dover Motor Speedway
NASCAR Odds, Predictions & Best Bets For Wurth 400 At Dover Motor Speedway
Dover Motor Speedway’s races have progressively shrunk over the years. The one-mile track has been a fixture on the Mid-Atlantic schedule since the September 1994 Splitfire Spark Plug 500 with four hours and 52 minutes runtime. The following season, Dover hosted two races, and over the years, drivers managed to get most of those races squeezed inside the four-hour mark.
The track's unique challenges push drivers to their limits, with a four-hour race taxing them to an extreme level. In 1998, both events were trimmed to 400 miles, reducing the race time to about three to three and a half hours. Despite the adjustment, Dover remains a grueling test, a testament to the skill and endurance of the NASCAR drivers, leading the series to reduce the track to one race per year.
Dover is a unique track with some similarities to Bristol Motor Speedway. Still, with that track covering the asphalt with dirt for one of its races for several years, its usefulness as a comparison was limited. Several years back, we added Darlington Raceway and Nashville Superspeedway to the mix and started comparing rough-surfaced courses. Some patterns emerged.
Tire management is a critical strategic element on these tracks, and while William Byron was the only driver who swept the top 10 on them last year, several others had three of four such finishes. They make up a considerable portion of this week’s top 10.
BetRivers has the most lucrative top-10 line this week at +1065, with BetMGM next at +1030.
NASCAR Odds, Predictions & Best Bets For Wurth 400 At Dover Motor Speedway
Dover Motor Speedway’s races have progressively shrunk over the years. The one-mile track has been a fixture on the Mid-Atlantic schedule since the September 1994 Splitfire Spark Plug 500 with four hours and 52 minutes runtime. The following season, Dover hosted two races, and over the years, drivers managed to get most of those races squeezed inside the four-hour mark.
The track's unique challenges push drivers to their limits, with a four-hour race taxing them to an extreme level. In 1998, both events were trimmed to 400 miles, reducing the race time to about three to three and a half hours. Despite the adjustment, Dover remains a grueling test, a testament to the skill and endurance of the NASCAR drivers, leading the series to reduce the track to one race per year.
Dover is a unique track with some similarities to Bristol Motor Speedway. Still, with that track covering the asphalt with dirt for one of its races for several years, its usefulness as a comparison was limited. Several years back, we added Darlington Raceway and Nashville Superspeedway to the mix and started comparing rough-surfaced courses. Some patterns emerged.
Tire management is a critical strategic element on these tracks, and while William Byron was the only driver who swept the top 10 on them last year, several others had three of four such finishes. They make up a considerable portion of this week’s top 10.
BetRivers has the most lucrative top-10 line this week at +1065, with BetMGM next at +1030.
NASCAR Picks For Wurth 400
1. William Byron ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +750
Consensus Odds*: +750 | Best Odds: BetRivers +800
It’s easy to place Byron in the No. 1 slot this week based on his 2023 rough track and 2024 records. He won at Darlington last year, part of a seven-race top-10 streak on this course type. Byron was fourth in three of the last four Dover races, including last year. So far this year, his three wins at Daytona International Speedway, the Circuit of the Americas (COTA), and Martinsville Speedway give him the most playoff bonus points – and the most momentum.
2. Martin Truex Jr. ⭐⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +650
Consensus Odds*: +650 | Best Odds: BetMGM +700
Dover is one of Truex’s home tracks. He spent his early years on the shores of New Jersey, and while his father was in the Busch North series, he frequently traveled to Dover and New Hampshire. He picked up a thing or two. Truex earned his first win on this track in 2007 and then failed to crack the top five again until he won in 2016. Since then, he’s been all-or-nothing with top-fives in eight of the next 11 races. The remaining efforts landed in the teens,
3. Alex Bowman ⭐⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +1600
Consensus Odds*: +1760 | Best Odds: BetMGM, Caesars, FanDuel, BetRivers +1800
Bowman has struggled enough this season that it is a little risky to rank him this high in the order, but he’s worth an outright win bet given his odds and is the best overall value in the field. Bowman missed last year’s Wurth 400 due to injury, and that was a shame because he entered the weekend with five top-fives in the previous six Dover races. One of these was a win in 2021.
4. Chase Elliott ⭐⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +1100
Consensus Odds*: +1220 | Best Odds: BetMGM +1400
Except for Kyle Larson, sportsbook traders are sleeping on Hendrick Motorsports (HMS) this week, which is a mistake. Like Bristol and Martinsville, this track has been kind to the organization throughout the years, with three wins to their credit since the fall of 2018. Larson also had a win driving for Chip Ganassi. Elliott accounts for two of those victories, with the most recent coming in 2022.
5. Kyle Larson ⭐⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +450
Consensus Odds*: +465 | Best Odds: BetMGM +500
Larson is the consensus favorite this week. He has a solid record at Dover, but we’re not sure he deserves to be nearly +200 lower than the field. As a point of comparison, this is almost the same consensus line he had in 2023 (+429), and he now has less momentum. Larson enters the weekend with a four-race, top-five streak on rough tracks, including a Darlington win last year and a fourth-place finish in Bristol this spring.
6. Ross Chastain ⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +750
Consensus Odds*: +720 | Best Odds: DraftKings, Caesars, BetRivers +750
Some of the same things said about Larson apply to Chastain. It’s not so much that he deserves a poor rating, but his odds are too low to make him a very lucrative value compared to the rest of the field. Worse still, his success at Dover is much more recent, with fewer consecutive strong runs. In his first six races there, his best finish was 20th. In better equipment, he finished third in 2022 and second last year. A victory at Nashville also goes into his plus column.
7. Denny Hamlin ⭐⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +750
Consensus Odds*: +750 | Best Odds: BetRivers +800
Hamlin has been hit-or-miss at Dover in the past few years, but he’s batting .556 regarding top-10s during the last 18. Only half of these were also in the top five, so bettors should be cautious before placing sizeable wagers. If this is the week to take a considerable risk, Hamlin won the last two rough-surface races at Bristol last fall and this spring. Over the past nine races on this course type, he has five top-fives and seven top-10s.
8. Chris Buescher ⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +2000
Consensus Odds*: +2000 | Best Odds: All five books +2000
With a seventh-place finish at Bristol this spring, Buescher has a current three-race top-10 streak on rough-surfaced tracks. Expand the parameters, and he has finished that well in six of the last seven races, including a win at Bristol in the fall of 2022. A poor finish last week at Talladega dropped him out of playoff contention, and he wants to get back into the top 16. Desire means a lot in this sport.
9. Brad Keselowski ⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +2200
Consensus Odds*: +2040 | Best Odds: DraftKings +2200
Keselowski is closing in on a victory. Back-to-back second-place finishes at Texas Motor Speedway and Talladega improved his confidence considerably. And he’s finished in the top 10 on five of the last six ovals. A third at Bristol on the heels of a fourth at Phoenix started his current run of success. At 22/1 on DraftKings for the outright win, Keselowski’s top-five odds get the drug to +275, which is a good cover bet.
10. Ty Gibbs ⭐⭐⭐
DraftKings: Outright Win +1600
Consensus Odds*: +1480 | Best Odds: DraftKings, FanDuel, BetRivers +1600
This is the type of track that suits Gibbs’ driving style. He can be aggressive entering the corners, with a ton of banking on which to lean. That will help him gain momentum on the one-mile track and allow Gibbs to settle into a rhythm. With no top-10s in his first six races, it took a while for him to get comfortable on rough-surfaced tracks, but he finished fifth and ninth in his last two Bristol attempts.
*Consensus odds at the average of six sportsbooks: DraftKings, Fanatics, MGM, Caesars, FanDuel, and BetRivers.
