Carfax 400 Qualifying Update

Michigan International Speedway -- 08/15/2010

Author: Jed Henson

Published: Sunday Aug 15 2010 6:32am

As expected, the NASCAR Sprint Cup teams got in all three practices and qualifying Friday and Saturday at Michigan International Speedway (MIS), giving those of us handicapping NASCAR a substantial amount of pre-race data to examine. In addition, according to the Goodyear Tire Notes posted on Jayski's Michigan Race Info page, the teams are running the same right- and left-side tires at MIS this week as they did in the June MIS race, giving an extra boost to race predictability.

However, the weather forecast for MIS at Weather.com calls for a 10-20% chance of scattered thunderstorms late Sunday morning and continuing through the afternoon, and that hurts predictability a bit because rain would alter the racing surface from what the teams have seen so far this week, and it could also give us a wild-card winner via a rain stoppage. Plus, as I noted in my race preview, the odds fuel-mileage tactics will come into play at MIS are elevated because the big, wide nature of this track generally produces fewer caution flags than most other tracks on the circuit.

So, I still rate tomorrow's race predictability at average, or maybe even a tick below. Bettors should therefore take a straight-forward approach to the betting lines.

Handicapping Michigan II
To produce my updated driver rankings, I crunched this week's practice and qualifying data, and then tweaked those initial rankings by comparing them to my mid-week rankings (giving more weight to the current rankings, of course). I further fine-tuned the list with impressions gleaned from the practice and qualifying telecasts, and my general impressions of which drivers are trending up and down on MIS-style tracks.

The result? My mid-week rankings match up pretty well with what transpired on Friday and Saturday, with a couple notable exceptions. For example, I rated Jimmie Johnson, Greg Biffle, Jeff Burton, Kasey Kahne and Kurt Busch very high, and they all looked so strong in the prelims they comprise my top five.

On the other hand, I rated Denny Hamlin #1 in my race preview, but he looked relatively slow on the stopwatch in the prelims and tumbles down in my rankings. And, I didn't really have Tony Stewart on my radar on Wednesday, but he was fairly sharp in the prelims, and as I've noted before, Stewart typically underperforms in the prelims, so when he looks good, look out.

Here's my updated top six, with the best odds I could find at press time:

1. Jimmie Johnson (3.8-1 at The Greek)
2. Greg Biffle (8-1 at WSEX and Bodog)
3. Jeff Burton (12-1 at Bodog, WSEX, The Greek and BetUS)
4. Kasey Kahne (8-1 at Bodog, WSEX and The Greek)
5. Kurt Busch (15-1 at BetUS)
6. Tony Stewart (9-1 at Bodog, WSEX and The Greek)

I don't this there's any value to be had betting Johnson at 3.8-1. Biffle should be profitable at 8-1, and I like the lines on Burton and Kurt Busch, too. The lines on Kahne and Stewart are iffy, though.

If you're laying some money down today, good luck!

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