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2024 Go Bowling at The Glen: NASCAR at Watkins Glen Odds, Picks & Predictions

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Every so often, the stars align for a weekend full of good opportunities for sports bettors to ride the wave from Friday to Sunday night. That’s what’s on deck for the weekend of Sept. 13.

The action gets started Friday with a top-25 College Football matchup, followed by a full Saturday of collegiate ball, leading right into the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Watkins Glen. We’ll either be licking our wounds or riding a high heading into Sunday’s early NFL slate, capped off with another round of games and the Cup Series fixture. Stock the fridge, pre-order the pizza and throw your phone on Do Not Disturb. We are in for a glorious 48-hour display of sport.

If you’re one of the lucky ones who also takes the road less traveled, that is motorsports betting, congratulations on having the best of both worlds. Let’s set up camp with my best bets for the 2024 Go Bowling at The Glen and full card for a weekend of NASCAR road course racing.

2024 Go Bowling at The Glen: NASCAR at Watkins Glen Odds, Picks & Predictions

Winning Manufacturer: Chevrolet (-139 via BetRivers) | 3u

Hendrick Motorsports (HMS) has been dominant along the shores of Seneca Lake, winning the past five Cup Series races there, courtesy of William Byron (2023), Kyle Larson (2022 and 2021) and Chase Elliott (2019 and 2018). If you factor in Alex Bowman’s win at the Chicago Street Course, the team is three for three winning at road courses this season.

You can back HMS to win at fair +165 odds. Yet, the safer play is to back the entire stable of drivers who fly the Chevrolet banner. Here’s the non-HMS, serious contenders that do so:

  • #1 Ross Chastain: 100% T10 rate at road courses in 2024
  • #8 Kyle Busch: Two-time Watkins Glen winner, 3.75 average finish the past month
  • #13 A.J. Allmendinger: Former Watkins Glen winner, 100% T10 rate at road courses in 2024
  • #16 Shane van Gisbergen: Three Xfinity Series road course wins this season
  • #99 Daniel Saurez: Former road course winner, Three T5s in seven Watkins Glen starts

Our friends from Pittsburgh are offering this at a sound -139, but I’d play it all the way down to -170.

Top 10: Christopher Bell (-143 via BetRivers) | 3u

Anytime you can back the hottest driver in the Cup Series to finish T10 at reasonable odds, it’s not a bad idea to do so. Christopher Bell has finished P6 or better in five of the last six races. Now he returns to one of his better tracks, where he has finishes of P3, P8 and P7 at in the Cup Series.

More so, The Oklahoma native is third in the Watkins Glen Next-Gen total speed rankings, courtesy of ifantasyrace.com, and was fourth in last year’s specifically. In that race, “C-Bell” was also the fastest late in a run and had an average running position of 5.4 (fifth best).

Bell’s runs at road courses this season have also been excellent. He was second at Circuit of the Americas (COTA), P9 at Sonoma and in position to win Chicago before a late-race wreck. This is an absolute hammer at -143 or anything better than -160.

Zane Smith (-114 via BetRivers) vs. Carson Hocevar | 2.5u

Here we have a rare opportunity to get invested with second-half riser Zane Smith. It was a tough start to the season for the Cup Series rookie. Yet, it’s hard to blame him, considering he was signed by Trackhouse Racing but is driving out of the Spire Motorsports garage with a rookie crew chief. Lately, he’s turned it on, with an average finish of 17.3 over the past six races and no finishes worse than P23.

He’s matched up against Carson Hocevar in this H2H. Hocevar has had the better overall inaugural Cup Series season, also racing Spire equipment. However, he hasn’t been quite as consistent as Smith lately, sporting a slightly worse average finish of 17.3 in that same span.

On road courses this season, Smith has an average finish of - funny enough - 17.3 and a 3-0 record against Hocevar (average finish of 21.0). While both have no Cup Series experience at Watkins Glen, they did run together in a 2021 Truck Series race here. Smith finished P6, while Hocevar was P10.

I expect four to five spots to again be the difference between these two on Sunday, with the 2022 Truck Series champion once again getting the best of Hocevar.

Other Cup Series Bets on My Card:

Mission 200 at The Glen (Xfinity) Bets:

Seth Woolcock is a featured writer and editor at BettingPros. For more sports betting and fantasy sports analysis from Seth, check out In-Between Media & follow him on X/Twitter @Between_SethFF.

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