NASCAR Fantasy Fusion: Enjoy Illinois 300 at Worldwide Technology Raceway

 

 

 

 

Distance: 1.25 miles
Backstretch Length: 1,976 feet
Frontstretch Length: 1,922-feet
Turns 1 & 2 Banking: 11 degrees
Turns 3 & 4 Banking: 9 degrees

 

The Southern 500 at Darlington did not disappoint. I was in the grandstands watching all the action and the pit lanes woes. Chase Briscoe made a statement with his fourth Cup Series win and his second consecutive Southern 500 victory. Chase shifts well and has another fast car this weekend. He'll start P3 behind Kyle Larson and Denny Hamlin in the Enjoy Illinois 300. Can he go back tdo back? Stay tuned.

 
This Week's Pick Strategy: Team Penske drivers have this St. Louis track figured out, having won two out of the three Cup races here. I'm going heavy on Team Penske and those drivers who love to shift and can take care of their brakes. The track has heavy braking zones and makes double-shifting a desirable skill.

Active Drivers with Most Top 5s
3 Races (2022 - 2024)

Joey Logano - 3
Both with 2 - Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin

Active Drivers with Most Top 10s
3 Races (2022 - 2024)
Joey Logano - 3
All with 2 - Kyle Busch, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Denny Hamlin, and Kyle Larson

Drivers with Most Top 10s at similar flat tracks (Iowa, New Hampshire, Phoenix and Richmond*)
18 Races (2022-2025)
Christopher Bell - 12

Both with 11 - Kyle Larson and Joey Logano
Both with 10 - Ryan Blaney and Denny Hamlin

Both with 9 - Chris Buescher and Brad Keselowski

All with 8 - William Byron, Ross Chastain, and Tyler Reddick

Both with 7 - Chase Elliott and Chase Briscoe 
All with 6 - Josh Berry, Bubba Wallace, Alex Bowman, Daniel Suarez, and Kyle Busch

Last Year's Race Winner: Austin Cindric

The Likely Suspects: Look for these drivers to run well on Sunday: Joey Logano, Denny Hamlin, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Kyle Busch, Kyle Larson, and Austin Cindric.

My 2 Cents: My no-brainer pick this week is Kyle Larson. My next picks are Denny Hamlin, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Ross Chastain, and Kyle Busch. I will complete my team with Chris Buescher and Brad Keselowski.

Second-Look Driver: This week's second-look driver is Carson Hocevar. Carson is a checkers or wreckers kind of driver who is not afraid to create a new passing lane that doesn't seem to exist to us mere mortals. Carson made his Cup debut at this track in 2023 as a substitute driver while running full-time in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series for Niece Motorsports. 

 

He was called up to replace Corey LaJoie who piloted Chase Elliott's No. 9 due to Chase's one-race suspension for taking out Denny Hamlin at the Coca-Cola 600. Up until having a brake rotor explode, it was an impressive run. Carson backed that up with an eighth-place finish at St. Louis last year in his NASCAR Cup Series rookie year in the No. 77 Chevrolet for Spire Motorsports.

My Fabulous 5 (Drivers most likely to finish in the Top 5):
Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Kyle Larson, Christopher Bell, and Chase Briscoe.

NASCAR Fantasy Live Line-Up:
Ryan Blaney, Kyle Larson, AJ Allmendinger, Zane Smith, and Carson Hocevar, with Kyle Busch in the garage. Featured Match-ups: Hamlin over Logano, Cindric over Bell, Briscoe over Bowman, and Elliott over Wallace.

Points to Ponder:

• A total of three different drivers have won a NASCAR Cup Series race at World Wide Technology Raceway – Joey Logano (2022), Kyle Busch (2023) and Austin Cindric (2024).
• Two drivers have finished runner-up in the three NASCAR Cup Series races at World Wide Technology Raceway – Kyle Busch (2022) and Denny Hamlin (2023 and 2024). 
• Joey Logano leads the NASCAR Cup Series in both Top 5s and Top 10s at World Wide Technology Raceway with three. He also leads in average finishes at World Wide Technology Raceway with a 3.0.
• Kyle Busch leads the NASCAR Cup Series in laps led at World Wide Technology Raceway with 202 laps led (32.2% of his laps completed).

Remember, if you're playing NASCAR Fantasy Live, make your final picks by 2:55 p.m. EST on Sunday, September 7th. Don't forget to select your bonus match-ups.

 

Enjoy the race!

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Carol D'Agostino has been playing Fantasy NASCAR for 18 years. She launched  NASCAR Fantasy Fusion for Skirts & Scuffs in October 2011. Each week, Carol pores through statistics and combs through her personal notebooks to arm fans with analysis and picking strategies that will leave their friends wondering how they got so smart. Carol also does race coverage for Skirts & Scuffs at Richmond Raceway and occasionally at her home track, Dover International Speedway. She is also part of the distinguished NASCAR Expert Picks panel at frcs.pro. formerly called Fantasy Racing Cheat Sheet. When she isn’t wielding her fantasy-racing superpowers, you’ll find Carol hammering out a news release or creating a marketing strategy at a small niche public relations firm she founded called Purple Cat or executing downtown revitalization projects for a small town on Marylan