NASCAR heads to Texas this weekend, where everything is bigger. After two weeks of back-to-back short track racing in Virginia at Richmond and Martinsville, it’s back to a bigger track at the 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway. Before we get into this week’s NASCAR Auto Trader Echopark 400 picks odds and best bets, let’s take a look back at Martinsville.
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NASCAR Auto Trader Echopark 400 at Texas Odds, Picks and Best Bets
It was a nonstop celebration weekend for Hendrick Motorsports. 40 years ago, the team talked Rick Hendrick into one more race before the team shuttered and closed its doors. Geoff Bodine took the #5 Hendrick Motorsports car to victory lane that day.
14 Cup series championships later, William Byron scored the 305th Cup Series win, and 29th at Martinsville alone for the most dominant team in NASCAR history. Byron’s teammates Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott wrapped up the top three, marking the first podium sweep in Martinsville Cup Series history.
Now, we turn our attention to Texas Motor Speedway. Hendrick’s Kyle Larson enters as the odds-on favorite. Two-time 2024 winner Denny Hamlin checks in second, while the Hamlin and Michael Jordan-owned car of Tyler Reddick is next up, along with last week’s winner William Byron.
NASCAR Odds to Win the Auto Trader Echopark 400
Kyle Larson +400
Denny Hamlin +700
Tyler Reddick +700
William Byron +700
Martin Truex Jr +1000
Ryan Blaney +1000
Christopher Bell +1200
Chase Elliott +1600
Ross Chastain +1600
Bubba Wallace +1600
Ty Gibbs +1800
Kyle Busch +2000
Joey Logano +2000
Alex Bowman +2000
Brad Keselowski +2500
Chris Buescher +2500
Erik Jones +6000
Noah Gragson +6600
Daniel Suarez +8000
Chase Briscoe +10000
Austin Hill +12500
Austin Cindric +20000
Michael McDowell +20000
Austin Dillion +20000
Ryan Preece +20000
Carson Hocevar +20000
Corey Lajoie +20000
Jimmie Johnson +20000
Zane Smith +20000
John Hunter Nemechek +20000
Ricky Stenhouse Jr +30000
Todd Gilliland +30000
Harrison Burton +50000
Justin Haley +75000
Ty Dillion +100000
Daniel Hemric +100000
Kaz Grala +100000
Brad Keselowski Top 10 (-110)
Brad Keselowski is good at Texas. In seven races in a row at Texas Motor Speedway, Keselowski has finished inside of the top 10. At Las Vegas easier this season, the truest comparison track to Texas, Brad was able to wheel his #6 car to a 13th place finish just outside the top 10.
Last season, at 1.5-mile or 2-mile comparable tracks, Keselowski finished fourth at Las Vegas (2), ninth at Kansas (2), and fourth at Michigan. Keselowski and teammate Chris Buescher (who won at Michigan) showed steady improvement in overall speed at the intermediate tracks toward the end of the season. Keselowski is one of my NASCAR best bets this week.
William Byron & Denny Hamlin Both to Finish Top 10 (+105)
This pre-built top 10 parlay is available over on Caesars Sportsbook and offers a lot of value. As I said on the NASCAR Gambling Podcast this week, some of these pre-built parlays match up a lot of drivers with high variables. Bring checkers or wreckers, guys.
In this case, you are getting two of the most consistent drivers in the series. They’ve won the last four races, so are clocking on all cylinders right now. At Las Vegas, they finished eighth and tenth.
In seven true 1.5-mile races in 2023, Byron’s 15th at Kansas (2) was his lone finish outside of the top 10. Denny Hamlin had an 11th at Las Vegas (1) and was wrecked by Chase Elliott (a wreck that led to Elliott being suspended a week) at Charlotte. In the other five, all top 10s for Hamlin.
William Byron Over Martin Truex Jr (-135)
There are a lot of tough matchups on the board this week, but this one available on SuperBook Sportsbook jumped out at me. I’ve made the case for Byron above, and let’s be honest. Byron has made the case for himself on the track as of late.
Truex has not been good in the two races at Texas Motor Speedway in the NextGen car. He finished 31st and 17th, while Byron finished seventh. He won the most recent race here in the fall of 2023.
In those seven 1.5-mile races in 2023, Byron got the best of Truex in all seven races. That alone is enough of a case to take the three-time 2024 winner William Byron.
Denny Hamlin to Win (+700)
If you believe in patterns, the last four races have gone: Hamlin, Byron, Hamlin, and Byron won last week, so Hamlin is due in the pattern! More so than that, though, Denny has been good on these intermediate tracks. His consistency was mentioned above, and his ability to close out races is something that can’t be overlooked.
Last year Hamlin won a thriller on the last lap pass of Kyle Larson at Kansas (1). At Kansas (2) in the fall, Hamlin would have won if not for a late-race restart that saw the car he owns get the win instead. Hamlin also won at Pocono and won at Charlotte in 2022.
Ross Chastain to Win (+1600)
This could be a sneaky NASCAR pick to win this week for the Watermelon Man. The last couple of weeks have been so-so for Chastain, but they’ve lacked the speed in the short-track package. At Las Vegas, it was a fourth-place finish for Chastain. Last season here at Texas, Ross finished second to William Byron.
Fifth at Las Vegas (2), fifth at Darlington (2), seventh at Michigan, fifth at Kansas (1), and a win at Nashville all show that Chastain has what it takes on the intermediate tracks and is a great value at 16/1 this week.
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