Daily Fantasy NASCAR Race Preview - Overton's 301

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Overton's 301

New Hampshire Motor Speedway - Loudon, NH
Track - 1.058 Mile Oval Intermediate
Banking - 12° 

This week the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series travels to New Hampshire Motor Speedway for the Overton's 301. This is the first of two races here at NHMS this season and will be the last year with double-duty as Las Vegas will take over the Playoff stop starting in 2018. The track is a 1.058 Mile oval that is flat with just 12° of banking and is best compared to Phoenix in size and car setups.

From a fantasy perspective, there are 301 laps so once again dominator points will be at the top of the checklist when constructing our lineups. Looking at the last six races here dating back to 2014, there have been eight drivers who have led 100+ laps including two in each of last year's races here at NHMS. Track position here is absolutely key as passing is very difficult. It has shown as all 12 drivers who have led over 60 laps in the last six races have all started inside the Top 10. Stay tuned for qualifying as it will be very important to determining our top plays and values. I will have the cheatsheet updated following each session and will update my final picks video at the bottom of the article. You can also visit JagerBombs Fantasy Sports Blog to check out all of my content covering a range of sports.

Let's dive in and take a look at some of the top trends and my top pre-qualifying/practice targets going into the race weekend.

Last Six Winners

• 2016 Fall - Kevin Harvick (Started 19th, led 8 laps)
• 2016 Summer - Matt Kenseth (Started 18th, led 38 laps)
• 2015 Fall - Matt Kenseth (Started 13th, led 27 laps)
• 2015 Summer -Kyle Busch (Started 4th, led 96 laps) 
• 2014 Fall - Joey Logano (Started 7th, led 73 laps)
• 2014 Summer - Brad Keselowski (Started 7th, led 138 laps) 

 

Weekend Schedule

• Practice 1 - Friday @ 11:30 a.m ET
• Qualifying - Friday @ 4:45 p.m. ET
• Practice 2 - Saturday @ 10:00 a.m. ET
• Practice 3 - Saturday @ 3:00 p.m. ET

 

 

 

Top 5 Current Track History at New Hampshire

No one has been more dominant here lately than Matt Kenseth, who has been the talk of the garage this week as he will not be returning to the #20 next season. In his last four races here at NHMS, he has two wins and is the only driver to finish all four races inside the Top 10. Joey Logano is right behind Kenseth with a 5.3 average finish in his last four races here with three Top 5 finishes. Kevin Harvick is the other winner in the Top 5 and the only other driver with three Top 5 finishes in the last four New Hampshire races and he also leads all drivers with 283 laps led.

 

Top 5 Career Track History at New Hampshire

No one driver has dominated here as there are four active drivers(Johnson, Newman, Kenseth, Kurt Busch) who have three wins here at NHMS and another five(Kyle Busch, Hamlin, Bowyer, Logano, Harvick) who have two wins. Jimmie Johnson and Matt Kenseth lead the way when looking at Top 5 finishes with 10 each while Johnson trails only Jeff Gordon with Career Top 10 finishes with 20. Kevin Harvick has proven to be a solid fantasy option through the years with 706 laps led(trail only Newman's 722) to go along with his two wins and 17 Top 10 finishes.

 

Top 5 Current Track Type History

Looking at the one-mile intermediate track history, rookie Daniel Suarez leads the way with an impressive but small sample size. He picked up his first Cup Series Top 10 at Phoenix(7th) back in March and finished 6th at Dover. Kevin Harvick once again shows up as he has dominated the one-mile tracks with four wins since the start of 2015 with an incredible 1,352 laps led. One driver who didn't make the list is Kyle Busch who has three finishes of 30th or worse but has eight Top 5 finishes and 569 laps led, trailing only Harvick in both categories.

 

 

Top 5 Current Form

Chase Elliott has made his way to the top of the form ranks with three Top 5's and five Top 10 finishes in his last six races. Looking at DraftKings points, which is what is really important, Kyle Busch has been dominating with an average of 55.5 DraftKings over the last five races. Kyle Larson, despite getting crushed with a 35 point P1 penalty,

 

 

Early Week Picks 

Kevin Harvick ($10,000) - He won the last race here back in September and has finished Top 5 or led the field in laps led in five straight races at NHMS.

Kyle Busch ($10,500) - Overdue for a win and comes back to NHMS with excellent track history with two wins and nine Top 5 finishes. Has been top of the field from a DraftKings perspective with an average of 55.5 DK points over the last five races.

Ryan Newman ($7,300) - Has three career wins and 18 Top 10 finishes here at NHMS and has led all active drivers in laps led. He has also done well on the one-mile intermediate tracks this year with a 4th at Dover(49.8 DK points) and a win at Phoenix(77.5 DK Points).

Aric Almirola ($6,600) - He returns to the #43 this week and perfect timing as the one-mile intermediates have been his best tracks. He is the only driver in the sub $7K range with a Top 5 here at NHMS and has a 20.8 career average finish. He started 26th in both races here last year and picked up positive place differential points in both finishing 19th and 17th.

 

Weekly YouTube Video

 

 

For a limited time, I am offering a copy of my DFS NASCAR cheathsheet which includes Track History, Current Form, Odds, Track Type History, Practice/Qualifying Ranks and much more. Get it HERE. I also have available my Race by Race Trends sheet you can view as well. 

 

If you have any questions scroll down to the comment section and join the conversation.Good Luck everyone!
Chris Durell has been playing Daily Fantasy Sports for four years and fantasy in general for more than a decade. He is active player in NFL, MLB, NHL, PGA, and of course NASCAR. He lives in Saskatchewan, Canada with his wife and two daughters. You can follow him on Twitter at @jager_bombs9 for advice, strategy, answers to any NASCAR questions or how he copes with the winters up north.