What will Playoff contenders do with a golden ticket to Phoenix on the line? That’s what’s on offer at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the first race of the Round of 8 of the Playoffs. The winner will get a guaranteed berth in the championship race at Phoenix.
It won’t be able to get the victory in Sunday’s South Point 400 (2:30 p.m. ET on NBC, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at the 1.5-mile track, though.
In five different Vegas races in the Playoffs, the track has produced five different winners, making it notably unpredictable. Plus, of the eight Playoff contenders, only Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr. have won at the track before, with Truex having done so twice.
Odds via BetMGM
+400 – Kyle Larson
+600 – William Byron
+600 – Denny Hamlin
+700 – Tyler Reddick
+800 – Martin Truex Jr.
+1100 – Kyle Busch
+1200 – Christopher Bell
+1400 – Chris Buescher
+1400 – Ryan Blaney
+1400 – Brad Keselowski
But the win is important. Ryan Blaney knows this firsthand: his teammate Joey Logano won the race at Las Vegas, which was then also the first race of the Round of 8, last season en route to his second championship. According to Blaney, the Vegas win was a big advantage for him.
“It’s huge,” Blaney said. “I mean, just having that prep time for two weeks with nothing else on your mind. Joey was able to do it with that group last year and you saw what happened, so it’s a huge advantage. I think Larson did it the year before. I think he won the first race of the Round of 8 and it just gives you so much more prep time for that race. It’s just all you’re thinking about, so that’s a big one.”
“Obviously, everyone is gunning to do it and try to win that one and move on, but it was massive for our group last year and it would be the same big advantage for any group if a Playoff car was to win,” he added.
Blaney could use a win most of all out of all eight drivers. He enters Las Vegas ten points below the cutline. There are three races this round to make up that deficit, but a win takes away any concern.
Also needing to make up points is Chris Buescher, though his three-point deficit is more manageable. Bescher’s RFK team has come alive late in the season, especially on ovals, and he’s hoping to continue that trend despite some bad luck so far in the postseason.
“We’ve made a lot of gains across the board and we’ve certainly been a lot more competitive at the last handful of mile-and-a-halves,” Buescher said. “We don’t have the best results to show for it. We had a tire go down at the end of Kansas and Texas certainly didn’t go the way we hoped, but we’ve had better speed.”
“Going to Vegas, I know we’re gonna be a lot better off this time,” he added. “Also, that was so long ago that we’ve made a lot of improvements as an organization. I know the garage probably has, but we’ve been able to measure our gains across a lot of different racetracks and mile-and-a-halves certainly being one of those styles. We’re looking at it as a great way to start our Round of 8.”
Christopher Bell and Tyler Reddick are also below the cutline heading into the first race of the round, both by eight points.
Above the cutline, the gaps are a bit bigger. Not so much for Kyle Larson, who’s still close to the danger zone with a three-point gap above the cutline, but Denny Hamlin is eleven points above and regular season champion Martin Truex Jr. has 15 points to spare.
In the best position, though, is William Byron. The driver with the most wins this season carries a big 20-point advantage into the Round of 8. And Byron is hoping to keep the wins going with big expectations for his performance.
“We’ve got to keep it rolling,” Byron said. “I’d like to do one-two-two in the next round. That would be ideal but keep performing where we want to be.”
Whatever happens with the Playoff drivers, the Next Gen car has put on good racing displays on mile-and-half tracks throughout the year, and Vegas should continue that positive trend for the fans since it’s always produced solid racing.
“Vegas is a great track that’s wide and you can run all over,” Martin Truex Jr. pointed out. We saw a lot of guys run high the last three races there with the bumps. I feel like the car has evolved and we’ve gotten better at being able to get through the bumps and move around. I expect it to be a great race out in Vegas. I love going out there and it’s a great racetrack.”
Truex himself has courted a bit of controversy. He’s consistently scored poorly in the CupScene Playoff Performance Ratings with bad runs in just about every race in the postseason, due to lack of speed or problems, but has managed to advance despite bleeding points because of the massive fifteen-Playoff-point haul awarded to the regular season champion.
According to Truex, he’s just taken advantage of the system as it exists.
“Stage points and bonus points certainly helped us a ton,” Truex admitted. “I didn’t create the system. We used it to our advantage.”
“That won’t get us through the next one,” he added. “The next one, you’ve got to be running up front. Two winners of the next three races are probably going to be playoff guys that are still going. Need to turn it up and we need to figure it out quickly. That’s the beauty and that’s the thing that sucks about this deal, you know what I mean? I’m sure there are guys who are upset. They outran us enough to get in, but they didn’t have the bonus points. We have some really good tracks for us this round.”
Ross Chastain knows how hard it is to run consistently well to make the next round. Despite some strong performances throughout the year, he was eliminated in the Round of 12. For Chastain, one bad run – not even of his own fault – was all it took.
“We were good at Charlotte, but not great because great would’ve meant we made the next round,” Chastain explained. “A lot of it goes back to Talladega and being in an accident before the end of the first stage. But we did everything we needed to do at Charlotte with getting bonus points and putting us in a position to take advantage of anyone else’s misfortune.”
It falls to the eight Playoff drivers to put themselves in that position to take advantage at Vegas and secure the ‘huge advantage’ heading into the championship race.
Xfinity Series Round of 8 begins with a chance for a championship
Las Vegas Motor Speedway means a lot to the Xfinity Series field. Any winner of the first race of the Round of 8 gets a spot at the championship finale at Phoenix and the chance to compete for the ultimate goal: an Xfinity Series championship.
But it won’t be easy on Saturday to get that coveted Alsco Uniforms 302 (3:30 p.m. ET on USA, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) win.
23 different drivers have won 32 Xfinity Series races at the track. One of those past winners is Austin Hill.
Hill enters with a big 21-point advantage to the cutline. That’s second only to John Hunter Nemechek, the driver with the most wins in the series, who has a 37-point advantage to begin the Round of 8. Justin Allgaier also has a 17-point gap to the good of the cutine.
In much more stressful position, Sam Mayer has just two points to bank on to start the round. Behind him, Cole Custer is just two points below. Both of those drivers are in very tenuous spots and could end up on opposite sides easily after Vegas.
For Custer, that’s the goal. The Stewart-Haas Racing driver is looking for consistency in the second-to-last round of the Playoffs to get him into the Championship 4 where he believes he belongs.
“I mean, overall, I feel like we’ve been a Championship 4 car and capable of making that final round all year,” Custer argued. “It’s just a matter of doing what we’ve been doing and making sure we maximize everything going into these final few races. Then, we just have to make sure we’re staying consistent like we have been.”
“I mean, some guys will try and get a little bit too much in the playoffs and get themselves in trouble. So, we just have to take what the races give us and go from there. I think we have a team that knows how to win races and championships. Some people might doubt us going into these next few races, but I think we’re going to surprise them. We’ve had good cars this past round, but I think the best is still to come,” he concluded.
Below Custer, Chandler Smith and Sheldon Creed have eleven and twelve points to make up. Creed announced this week that he won’t be returning to his Richard Childress Racing ride, where he’s failed to pick up his first Xfinity Series win, despite coming close, next season.
Finally, Sammy Smith enters in the worst position, with 14 points to make up to the cutline before the round has even started.
Custer’s teammate, Vegas native Riley Herbst began his racing career in the bullring opposite Las Vegas Motor Speedway. He’s yet to pick up his first Xfinity Series win this season, which is always the goal, but he especially hopes to do it at Vegas.
“It would mean a lot. Getting a win in the Xfinity Series is all that I’ve been chasing, but to get it at my home track would just make it that much more special,” Herbst said. ”
We have some work to do, but I think we have the speed to do it. We’ve brought some fast cars to intermediate tracks this year, so I think we can compete up front. It’s going to take a fast car, fast pit stops, and no mistakes to make it to victory lane, though. I think 2023 has thrown us a lot of bad luck, but I want to finish out this year strong. There are only four races to go. Four more chances to go for the win.”
NASCAR Cup Series
Next Race: South Point 400
The Place: Las Vegas Motor Speedway
The Date: Sunday, October 15
The Time: 2:30 p.m. ET
The Purse: $7,785,320
TV: NBC, 2 p.m. ET
Radio: PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR (Channel 90)
Distance: 400.5 miles (267 Laps); Stage 1 (Ends on Lap 80),
Stage 2 (Ends on Lap 165), Final Stage (Ends on Lap 267)
NASCAR Xfinity Series
Next Race: Alsco Uniforms 302
The Place: Las Vegas Motor Speedway
The Date: Saturday, October 14
The Time: 3:30 p.m. ET
The Purse: $1,329,729
TV: USA, 3 p.m. ET
Radio: PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR (Channel 90)
Distance: 301.5 miles (201 Laps); Stage 1 (Ends on Lap 45),
Stage 2 (Ends on Lap 90), Final Stage (Ends on Lap 201)
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