Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course is the first of back to back road course races. The Cup Series has already had two races at road courses and another similar style race on the streets of Chicago. As such we have a decent amount of data from 2023 to rely on. We also have significant amounts of data from the 2022 season that can be used as well.
In addition to the 36 charter cars, this week’s race also includes three open cars. Shane Van Gisbergen, the winner from Chicago, returns to the Trackhouse Project 91 car. Joining SVG from the Australian Supercars series is that series points leader Brodie Kostecki. Kostecki will pilot the number 33 Chevy Camaro for Richard Childress Racing. Finally, 23XI will field a third Toyota Camry for FIA World Endurance driver Kamui Kobayashi. This means that the field is quite stacked with talented ringers. That said, I have identified a Top 10 pick that I am ready to pounce on now before practice and qualifying.
I’m returning to the McDowell well for the fourth time at a road/street course this year. McDowell’s odds have continued to get shorter for this market all year. He was +165 when I took him for a Top 10 at Circuit of the America’s in March. He shortened to +130 when I took him again for a Top 10 at Sonoma. By the time I took him for a Top 10 at the Chicago Street Course he was down to +105. McDowell has rewarded me with Top 10s at two of the three races. He was also a Top 10 car for a good chunk of the day at COTA before he was shuffled back in an overtime restart. We have gotten a little bit back this week as he is available at +110, but yet again I see this as a value.
I as wrote before Chicago, McDowell has completed over 75% of all road course laps run in the Gen 7 car inside the Top 10. At Chicago he continued that trend completing 63 of the 75 laps of that race in the Top 10 on route to a seventh place finish. Last year here at the Indy Road Course he completed 70.3% of his laps inside the Top 10. McDowell is now six of nine finishing inside the Top 10 at road courses in the Gen 7 car. Simply put, he is clearly has a better than 47.62% chance of finishing inside the Top 10. Given the rate at which he has put his car inside the Top 10 I am comfortable taking this down to even money.
