We’ve come to a summer stretch of the Cup schedule, highlighted by a bracketed tournament pitting driver against driver, head-to-head. (For your chance to participate along and win, head on over to http://nascar.com/bracketchallenge) Who will win head-to-head today in Atlanta? While we don’t have all of the answers, we have a couple wagers on today’s race.
Here’s what to look for:
–Joey Logano will be starting from Pole and leading a Ford contingent that fills the Top 8. This track has come to be a mini-Daytona in recent years, so nothing is guaranteed. More good news for Logano though: he actually won this race a year ago! He also won the 2023 Spring race.
-This is our second Atlanta race of the year, the first one went to Christopher Bell. He’s really been a wild card for any track recently in the sense that if there’s a checkered flag at the end, he might be the won holding it.
-Over the last ten races, Ryan Blaney has nine Top 10s at Atlanta. Seven of those are Top 5s, and he’s starting 3rd tonight. His 5.7 average finish tops all active drivers, and he has by far the most points at this track in that stretch.
-In addition to Joey Logano (1st) and Ryan Blaney (3rd), Austin Cindric makes three Penske Fords in the Top 4 starting positions. While things didn’t go according to plan in the Spring race (28th), Cindric was on a string of five straight Top 12 finishes. Can Cindric get things pointed in the right direction today?
–Daniel Suarez was a recent winner here, and has four Top 5s in the last ten races. As with Cindric int he Spring, things didn’t go so hot (33rd), but he was 2nd-1st-2nd in the three races right before that. He’s got some work to do today though — Suarez rolls off 31st…with the race sponsor as his own!
Coverage of the race starts on TNT at 7:00pm, green flag scheduled for 7:19pm.
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