After Jimmie Johnson’s coronavirus scare last weekend, it’ll be great to see him back on track in Kentucky. While it’s a standard cookie-cutter track, it produced a great finish last year.

And if you’ve been following the NASCAR Xfinity Series, a questionable racing move by one driver on Friday night led to a post-race… confrontation.

With all of that in mind, I’m excited to see what the Cup Series has in store for us this time out.

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Past Performance at Kentucky and Kansas

Kentucky Speedway, like Kansas Speedway, is a 1.5-mile D-shaped oval. Of the five active Kentucky race winners, four have won at Kansas (Keselowski, Truex, Kenseth, Ky. Busch). Two of the three drivers with multiple wins at Kentucky have multiple wins at Kansas (Keselowski and Truex). And of the top-5 drivers in driver rating for the last three Kentucky races, three of them are also top-5 at Kansas (Harvick, Ky. Busch, Truex).

As a result, I’ve combined drivers’ career stats at both tracks.

Driver Name	Avg Finish	Races	Wins	Top 5’s	Top 10’s	Driver Rating (Last 9)
Tyler Reddick	9.00	1	0	0	1	78.10
Kevin Harvick	10.03	37	3	9	21	112.98
Brad Keselowski	12.45	29	5	8	16	89.38
Chase Elliott	12.83	12	1	5	6	95.42
Martin Truex, Jr.	13.09	32	4	10	15	115.53
Kyle Busch	13.15	33	3	14	19	115.96
Matt Kenseth	13.36	33	3	10	19	77.00
Erik Jones	13.40	10	0	3	7	93.84
Kurt Busch	14.25	37	1	6	17	95.26
Denny Hamlin	15.03	32	2	11	12	92.76
Ryan Blaney	15.50	14	0	4	7	99.78
Joey Logano	16.04	30	2	9	14	90.99

Kevin Harvick leads the way in average finish among the drivers with multiple starts at these tracks. His three wins all came at Kansas, although he arguably should’ve won the 2016 Kentucky race after leading just under half the laps. He has only scored one top-5 at Kentucky, but his six top-10s and 10.78-place average finish suggest that he’s due for a better finish.

The two leaders in driver rating, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex, Jr., have a combined seven wins in 65 starts at the two tracks. Ky. Busch almost won here last year, and he’s got an average finish of 3.67 in the last three Kentucky races. His 184 laps led trails only Truex, who led 326 laps on his way to a pair of Kentucky wins. He struggled here in 2019, however, finishing 19th and failing to lead a lap.

Brad Keselowski leads the board in both wins (5) and win percentage (17%). If you isolate his Kentucky stats, his wins (3) and win percentage (33%) are even more impressive. However, he hasn’t had a good run here since 2016 — in the three races since then, he two finishes outside the top-15. Those results look more like deviations from the norm when you weigh Kansas, however, as he’s posted one win, two top-5s, and three top-10s there in the six races since 2016. While Keselowski has been too up-and-down for my tastes, I can understand why someone else might bet on him this weekend.

Chase Elliott ranks third in average finish among drivers with multiple starts here. Elliott has only posted one top-5 at Kentucky, but his hot streak at Kansas makes me think he’s due for some success here. In Elliott’s last five races at Kansas, he’s posted four top-5s and a win.

Like Elliott, I believe Ryan Blaney is due for some course correction at Kentucky. He has the fourth-best driver rating at these tracks at 99.78, and his impressive consistency in Kansas drives that. He almost won the fall Kansas race in 2017, and since then, he’s posted driver ratings above 100 in all but one event — and that’s despite three finishes outside the top-15. Also like Elliott, he’s posted top-10s in half of his races at these tracks.

Denny Hamlin isn’t great at these two tracks, but he’s been great in 2020, and he’s been good at them in the new package. He dominated last fall’s Kansas race by leading more than half the laps, and he posted a top-5 in the Kentucky race as well.

Lastly, Tyler Reddick tops the chart in average finish due to his top-10 finish at Kansas last year. He accomplished this in a third car fielded by Richard Childress Racing, not in a full-time car, so the feat was even more impressive. The result shouldn’t have been surprising, as he’s done very well at Kansas and Kentucky in the Xfinity Series.

Driver Name	Avg Finish	Races	Wins	Top 5’s	Top 10’s	Driver Rating
Tyler Reddick	4.14	7	1	5	7	115.45

Although he only won once, his three top-3s and five top-5s demonstrate his consistency. That one win also came at Kentucky, so it’s all the more reason to believe he can be competitive on Sunday.

Recent Speed

Equipment often limits drivers in NASCAR, so it’s essential to factor recent speed into our betting predictions. Since driver rating weighs stats like laps led and average running position, it’s a useful metric to gauge how well a driver’s car has performed from week to week. I’ve limited the sample to each driver’s performances in the intermediate track package.

Driver	Driver Rating (Intermed.)
Kevin Harvick	117.78
Chase Elliott	104.80
Denny Hamlin	98.69
Ryan Blaney	97.53
Martin Truex, Jr.	96.48
Kyle Busch	92.46
Tyler Reddick	77.57

The past three races have been the Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin show — the duo combined for three wins and five top-3s. They also led 40 percent of the laps across the three events. All three events used the intermediate package, and while Pocono and Indianapolis’ flat corners aren’t much like Kentucky, the results do suggest continued success for the two drivers.

Chase Elliott is the only driver to top one of them in driver rating at intermediate tracks. He has one win and six top-5s at intermediates this year (of a possible 11), and he’s been best at 1.5-mile tracks like Charlotte and Homestead.

Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney posts the next-best numbers, and like Elliott, four of his best finishes all came at 1.5-mile tracks. Blaney finished third in Charlotte twice, and he posted the same result at Homestead. He also finished fourth at Atlanta, and he arguably should’ve won at Las Vegas but finished 11th.

Aside from Hamlin, Joe Gibbs Racing has struggled in 2020. You can tell that from Martin Truex, Jr. and Kyle Busch’s intermediate driver ratings. The two drivers have combined for just one win in 32 starts, and in their combined 10 attempts at 1.5-mile tracks, they’ve only posted three top-10s.

Tyler Reddick rounds out the list. Richard Childress Racing’s equipment hasn’t been great this year, but he’s been able to pilot it to some success. He has one top-5 and two top-10s at 1.5-mile tracks, and when you isolate his driver rating for those races, it jumps to 86.8 — less than six points shy of Busch.

Betting Odds

Let’s take a look at the betting odds for our featured drivers over at DraftKings Sportsbook.

Driver	To Win	Top-5	Top-10
Kyle Busch	+500	+100	-385
Kevin Harvick	+500	+100	-385
Denny Hamlin	+650	+120	-295
Martin Truex, Jr.	+650	+120	-295
Chase Elliott	+800	+140	-240
Ryan Blaney	+1200	+200	-162
Tyler Reddick	+6600	+900	+180

Kyle Busch’s recent dominance at Kentucky makes him a co-favorite with Kevin Harvick this weekend, but I don’t think it’s deserved. It’s perplexing to see a driver who has failed to win through 16 races that high on the board. None of his lines offer good betting value.

Best Bets for Kentucky

Last week’s predictions went two for five.

Kevin Harvick (-115) to beat Kyle Busch
For a toss-up line, this play is close to a sure-thing. Harvick is 3-2 over Busch through the first five races at 1.5-mile tracks, and he’s 11-5 over him on the year. The implied odds of his line are 53.48 percent, considerably lower than Harvick’s rate of success at 1.5-mile tracks (60%) and overall (68.8%).

To Win: Chase Elliott (+800) AND To Win: Ryan Blaney (+1200)
If you’re going to bet on a winner this weekend, both of these guys make sense as longer-odd options. Elliott’s high driver rating at intermediate tracks suggests that he’ll be competitive on Sunday despite his mediocre Kentucky resume, and a one-unit play on him would offer substantial returns. Likewise, Blaney has been incredibly impressive at 1.5-mile tracks this year, and he might be able to make up for his loss at Las Vegas this weekend. He’s another one-unit play that would pay dividends. You should consider playing them both.

To Finish Top-5: Chase Elliott (+140)
Even if Chase can’t pull off the win, he should be able to post another top-5 result. At each 1.5-mile event where he didn’t post a top-5 finish (Las Vegas and Atlanta), he still managed to post a top-5 driver rating. He just needs to finish races.

To Finish Top-5: Ryan Blaney (+200)
Like Elliott, he managed a top-5 driver rating in the only 1.5-mile event where he didn’t post a top-5 result. His long odds make him an even more attractive bet for this race, as you can triple your money by betting on him to finish where he’s finished in 80 percent of 1.5-mile events this year.

To Finish Top-10: Tyler Reddick (+180)
These are super long odds for a top-10 finish. Since there are only 38 cars entered, 26 percent of drivers will post a top-10 finish, and this line gives Reddick only a 35.71 percent chance to do so. Reddick has posted two top-10s in the five 1.5-mile tracks so far, which translates to 40 percent — a notch better than the implied odds.

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Isaiah Sirois is a featured writer at BettingPros. For more from Isaiah, check out his archive and follow him @is_sirois.