The Tennis Database presents: Nascar at Las Vegas

Sportsbooks continue to put up head-to-head odds later and later, so I am left with little time to actually write and explain the thought process (if anyone actually cares).

BetOnline went up at 10:30am Sunday, so, it’s speed-prep… again. This week the circuit is in Las Vegas and I’ve chosen Kansas and Chicagoland as my comparables to enahnce the sample size.

Tracks

I read some cases being made for Michigan being a comparable and Atlanta being a comparable due to tire wear. I am far from an expert and haven’t been able to properly quantify tire wear or find a true tracking system for that on the interwebs. So, I discounted Michigan due to it being a little longer of a track and I discounted Atlanta because everything I read up on last year was very adament about keeping Atlanta/Charlotte/Texas together.

Top Ten History

I like sticking to top tens as a barometer of past success because it just seems so much crazy stuff happens late in races that the winner is almost never a great indicator of who ‘ran well’.

To the surprise of no one, Harvick, Truex and Keselowski look like they are super comfortable at these three tracks, while Kyle Larson and Joey Logano seem specifically happy in the desert.

Crew Chief Top Tens

Looking at crew chiefs does nothing to dissuade anyone from liking Harvick, Truex and Keselowski. And it actually helps boost Logano and Blaney.

I might be Team Penske today. As an aside, it looks like Chris Bell’s crew chief has had plenty of success in Vegas .

Laps Led

Another method I like for trying to discern performance over finish is laps led - if your car was good enough to get to the front for at least a portion of the race than you probably know what you are doing at that track, despite whatever might have befell you on the way to the finish line.

This doesn’t change anything for Harvick and Truex. But, it does elevate Logano (who notoriously has an issue closing races in my opinion). It also elevates Kyle Busch - another guy who seems to get wrapped up in a lot of noise on the race track. Lastly, it looks like Elliott is making a push to be successful at these three tracks - especially if you remove his earlier starts at a younger age.
It does highlight the fact that Keselowski might be a bit of a vulture, not leading laps but stealing wins and top 5 or top 10 finishes.

Grid

I’m not a huge believer in starting position being of importance but it helps for DFs. I do like to study pit stall assignments though and I do throw that into my formula.

Odds:

I toss everything in a formula (on a spreadsheet) and I come up with these outright odds. I definitely still can’t get the odds low enough at the front end and I still can’t get the odds pushed out far enough for the bottom ten or so drivers but it is what is. Let’s see how they compare with the market:

There are four drivers, which seems like a lot, that I see ‘value’ on based on my numbers. There are certainly a bunch of longshots that are appetizing but I am sticking with the idea/philosophy that triple digit longshots are not worth it in Nascar.

H2H’s

This is easily the most h2h’s I’ve ever seen offered, despite the late opening of the market. I show an ‘edge’ on like 65% of them but I won’t bet them all because there are one or two metrics I don’t really talk about that I like to use to filter the h2h’s. Anyway, it will still be the biggest outlay I’ve had on a race since I started looking at Nascar.

Picks: