NASCAR is in Sin City this weekend for 400 miles of racing at Las Vegas Motor Speedway (LVMS). Oddly enough, qualifying was washed out in one of the driest parts of the country, which means the field will be set by last year’s owner’s points. As a result, Kyle Busch will lead the field to the green flag for 267 laps of racing at the 1.5-mile oval.
This is the second year of the current aerodynamic package. Nine races were run at 1.5-mile tracks excluding Homestead, which is grouped in the steep track category, and Atlanta, which used a slightly different aero package. I’ll rely on those nine races, but also adjust for track specifics as well as practice results to help you optimize your DFS lineups this weekend.
Lineup Construction Strategy
Like last weekend for Daytona, I will use DraftKings scoring for the basis of my strategic advice. On FanDuel, you can weight place differential less, and finishing position more.
Last year at Las Vegas, the starting position of the two winning lineups were as follows:
- Spring: 10, 20, 23, 25, 28, 38
- Fall: 8, 22, 23, 24, 27, 33
That’s one driver starting inside the top 10, and the rest starting 20th or worse. Do I expect the same trend to continue this weekend? Not necessarily, especially with a qualifying washout. But that should give us an idea that place differential is going to be important.
Because there are only 267 laps, and Las Vegas is a place where we get only one or two drivers to dominate a race — in other words, lead a large chunk of laps while also picking up many fast laps — you can plan around that when building your lineups. For each lineup you create, start by picking just one or two expensive drivers who you expect can dominate the race, then fill the rest of your lineup by optimizing the combination of place differential and finishing position while remaining under the salary cap.
So who do I like to dominate? Let’s dive in.
Dominators
Here are a few drivers I like as potential dominators, with my cash game and GPP preference listed at the end.
