A Betting Guide to NASCAR
It’s the return week of NASCAR on the asphalt as the circuit returns after a two-month layoff as they make the trek to Darlington for the first of two NASCAR Cup Series races there in the span of four days. The 400-mile race is scheduled to take to the track at 3:30 pm ET on Sunday and will be televised on FOX. With that in mind, it seems like a solid opportunity to give a brief rundown about how to bet on NASCAR races to give you the best strategy to put down money as things get back to turning and burning.
Betting on NASCAR has increased in the last couple of years as it’s become more popular at the sportsbooks. There are a variety of different options that bettors can look at when it comes to putting money down on NASCAR races. Let’s take a look at some of the most common options when it comes to placing your bets.
Betting On a Winner: The most common option that comes to mind when you’re putting down money on a NASCAR race is to drop some money on who you think is going to win. Odds for the proverbial favorite are usually have a + in front of them as opposed to the typical – you would see on a favorite in a normal event. That’s simply due to the fact that there are usually between 40 and 43 cars competing to try and emerge as the winner over the course of 400, 500 or 600 miles of racing. There are a lot of variables in play here, such as engine or transmission issues, crashes or other issues that can knock a contender out of the race. For example, if you laid a bet on Denny Hamlin +1000 and he took the checkered flag, your $100 bet would turn into a cool $1000.
Betting on Futures: At any point in the season, you could potentially drop a bet on how things might unfold at the end of the season. That means you could wager on who ends up winning the NASCAR Cup title at the end of the season. At the start of the year, Martin Truex Jr. was the favorite to win the title at +550 while Kevin Harvick was at +650. Meanwhile, seven-time Cup winner Jimmie Johnson, in his final season on the circuit, was going off at +4000 odds. This is pretty cut and dry: you lay down some money on who you expect to end up with the title after the season is over and if it pans out, you can clean up at the window.
Taking the Field: If you don’t want to take a run at one of the favorites in a given race, there’s always the alternative option. Any racer that hasn’t been posted with their own individual odds can be taken as part of the field. If one of the racers that aren’t listed with odds of their own come up as the winner, you cash in.
Prop Bets: There are a variety of different prop bets that you can wager on at any given race. An example of a prop bet could be betting on which car manufacturer makes the winning vehicle or which racer would finish best out of a group of three or four racers. The odds would vary depending on which racers are in the field and how much success they have had at the given track. Those bets can potentially cash in at a substantially higher rate than a normal one on one type of bet would.
Matchup Bets: This is about as close as you would get to a normal sporting event when it comes to wagers. You’ll see a pair of drivers listed and you’re picking which driver you think will post the better finish when the race comes to a close. This is pretty simple as the odds read like a normal game bet would: if Ryan Newman (-175) was favored to place higher than Chase Elliott (+150) at Talladega for example and you bet on Newman, you would have to bet $175 to win $100. If you bet on Elliott, it would be a $100 bet to earn a potential $150 return.
Top 3/Top 5/Top 10 Bets: If you’re worried about betting on an individual winner or taking the risk on the field, there’s always the option of betting on placing. An example from a previous race was the Pure Michigan 400: Jeff Gordon was going off at +250 to finish in the top three and +180 to finish in the top five of that race. The odds are lower, meaning a lower return on investment but given the fact that you have more chances of your bet winning, that has to be expected to say the least.
Others: There are a variety of other bets that you can make when it comes to NASCAR races. You can bet on who would qualify higher during qualifying before a race. You can bet on who will lead the most laps, how many caution flags will be waved in the race and how many racers action complete the race. There are usually over/unders on those kinds of race, which would come with lower odds in most cases.
That gives you a brief overview of things you can wager on and how things work when it comes to the NASCAR circuit. Hopefully it helps you in your endeavors to cash in on the asphalt.