Following Austin Dillon‘s playoff ticket-punching victory at Daytona, the NASCAR Cup Series heads to Darlington to open up the playoffs with the Cook Out Southern 500. Let’s dive into the track information NASCAR DFS drivers need to know, what to expect for this weekend’s running of the Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington and some early NASCAR fantasy picks.
NASCAR DFS Preview: Cook Out Southern 500
Darlington Raceway Preview
- Track: Darlington Raceway
- Location: Darlington, South Carolina
- Length: 1.366 miles (asphalt)
- Banking: 25 degrees in turns one and two, 23 degrees in turns three and four
- Best corollary tracks: Dover, Nashville, Miami-Homestead
- Dominator Points:
- DraftKings: 91.78 – laps led, 165.15 – fastest laps
- FanDuel: 36.7 – laps led
- Past winners: Joey Logano (2022), Denny Hamlin (2021B), Martin Truex Jr. (2021A)
- Betting favorite: Kyle Larson/Denny Hamlin +600
- Entry List: 36 drivers, including J.J. Yeley (15), Daniel Hemric (16) and Landon Cassill (77)
- Weather: High of 86, scattered thunderstorms throughout the morning, mostly cloudy through the rest of the day
- Watch: USA
- Listen: MRN (MRN, NASCAR.com, NASCAR Sirius/XM Channel 90)
On Track Schedule (All Times Eastern)
- Saturday, September 3
- 12:05 p.m.: Practice
- 12:50 p.m.: Qualifying
- Sunday, September 4
- 6:00 p.m.: green flag (115/230/367 laps)
2022 Cook Out Southern 500 NASCAR DFS Picks
2022 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs
With just 10 cars crossing the start-finish line, as the checkered flag waved, Dillon grabbed his first victory of the 2022 season as well as the 15th playoff seat. In what could have removed Ryan Blaney from the playoffs, had Kurt Busch been able to return this weekend at Darlington, Dillon took advantage of the “win and in” scenario on the table, much the same way that Jeremy Clements did in the Xfinity Series race on Friday evening. But with Busch removing himself from the playoff picture, Dillon grabbed a seat and Blaney became the last driver in via points. Truth be told, Truex could have made his way into the playoffs as well, via points, had Austin Cindric not been given the bump and run by Dillon. However, sweating out Dillon versus Cindric was the scenario that Truex put himself into after he wrecked out in an incident with Ross Chastain.
Thus, with the playoff seeding established, the first round kicks off this weekend at Darlington in what will be the first of three races that will determine which of four drivers are removed as the field gets whittled down to just 12 in three weeks at Texas. Via his regular-season crown, Chase Elliott opens atop the leaderboard with 2,040 points and a 15-point lead over Logano, who holds a 5-point margin over Chastain in third. The 2022 Series champion Larson sits in fourth with 2,019 points and a 5-point margin over teammate William Byron. Hamlin sits in sixth, tied with Blaney with 2,013 points and a 1-point gap over Tyler Reddick and Kevin Harvick. Christopher Bell opens up the playoffs with 2,011 points, sitting in 10th, while his Joe Gibbs teammate Kyle Busch trails by a single point. Finally, Chase Briscoe is the last man in 12th with 2,009 points.
The final four spots in the playoffs are occupied by Daniel Suarez (2007), Cindric (2006), Alex Bowman (2006) and Dillon (2005). With a victory on Sunday evening, any of these 16 drivers can secure their spot in the second round of the playoffs. Yet the key for the majority of these drivers will be simply finishing well and not putting themselves into an early points deficit with a DNF.
Latest NASCAR DFS Content
- DraftKings NASCAR Cheat Sheet: NASCAR DFS Sims Picks for the GEICO 500 at Talladega
- NASCAR DFS Picks: Top Drivers for the GEICO 500 at Talladega (2024)
- NASCAR DFS Picks: Top Drivers for the AutoTrader EchoPark Automotive 400 at Texas (2024)
- NASCAR DFS Picks: Top Drivers for the Cook Out 400 at Martinsville (2024)
- NASCAR DFS Picks: Top Drivers for the EchoPark Texas Grand Prix at the Circuit of the Americas (2024)
- Stokastic DFS on Youtube
NASCAR Darlington Raceway Preview
For the second time this season, the NASCAR Cup Series returns to the “Lady in Black” for 367 laps (500 miles) around this egg-shaped, steeply banked fixture of NASCAR. In the first iteration of this race, Logano went to victory lane, but it was anything close to a dominating win for Logano despite him leading the most laps that Sunday afternoon. Logano was fast in Saturday’s practice session, running quickly in the short-run metrics and long-run metrics. This speed followed him into Sunday as he ranked third in green flag speed and first in total speed ranking. Yet, in true Logano fashion, he managed to lose the lead on the first lap to Kyle Larson. He was able to grab the lead on a lap-seven restart (Brad Keselowski‘s single-car accident on lap four) but then handed the lead right back to Larson who led up right until a competition caution on lap 31.
Following pitstops, Logano found his way to the lead again but held it this time. In all, Logano never really dominated a portion of the race as is prone to see at Darlington but led in spurts – a pattern that Sunday. In a 293-lap event, no one led more than a 41-lap section of the event (Logano). In the end, Byron was leading but a closing Logano gave Byron the chrome horn into the corner and Logano sailed into victory as Byron dropped from second to 13th with a hobbling vehicle. Oddly enough, since then, Byron has been a shell of his former self, with just one top-10 finish since Darlington and an average finish of 20th.
That Sunday’s optimal lineup was just a singular dominator build, an outcome that should not be expected this Sunday. In all, besides Logano, seven other drivers led double-digit laps that day at Darlington. However, by the time the checkered flag waved none of them finished any better than 14th with four of the seven losing 20 or more place differential points. This race’s final box score was not a true representation of the full race, including the optimal DraftKings and FanDuel lineups that look like a race with far fewer laps.
With 367 laps on tap for Sunday evening, optimal builds could go anywhere from a two to three dominator build like last year’s Cook Out Southern 500 where the duo of Larson and Hamlin went optimal combining to lead 302 laps and finishing second and first.
Thanks for reading to the end of this article! If you appreciate this free content and want to see more of it every day, you can help us out by sharing this article on social media!
[NASCARPAGE]
