NASCAR heads to the Bluegrass state, for the Quaker State 400 at Kentucky Speedway. A track where Chevrolet has never won a race in the Cup series. The track has been dominated by Joe Gibbs Racing and Team Penske primarily, but Martin Truex Jr took his Furniture Row Racing team to victory lane in each of the last two races at the track. He is at Joe Gibbs now so, he could be in an even better spot. Saturday Night’s race marks only the ninth cup race to ever be run at the track. Brad Keselowski knows the track very well having won their three times. Kyle Busch also has two victories at Kentucky, and the only other winner was Matt Kenseth in 2012. If Chevy is going to break or even another Ford team hope will have to be put on the backs of Chase Elliott for Hendrick Motorsports or Kevin Harvick for Stewart-Haas Racing. Is it time for Jimmie Johnson to break through after back-to-back top-five finishes. Daytona had all kinds of surprises including a shocking winner as Justin Haley piloted a well-underfuded team to victory lane at the World’s Center of Racing in just his third cup series start. We may not see anything like that this week, however. Let’s dive into the NASCAR Quaker State 400 Free Racing Picks for this Saturday night.
The favorite heading into Saturday’s race at Kentucky, and for good reason as Martin is a two-time winner at the track. His two wins at Kentucky were back-to-back, in fact, the last two races there were won by Truex. He has been pretty dominate at the track as of late as well leading a combined 372 laps in the last three Kentucky races. Prior to those three races, he had only led one lap at the track. In his eight starts at the track, Truex has posted five top 10 finishes. He knows how to get the job done at the track as does his team owner Joe Gibbs who has three wins at the track and so does Toyota who has won five of the eight races. Truex will be looking for a third consecutive win at Kentucky, and don’t be shocked if he pulls it off.
Yet another Toyota driver who has seen plenty of success at Kentucky Speedway. Kyle is a two-time winner at the track including the inaugural race winner in 2011. He picked up his second win in the Blue Grass State in 2015. Add in his seven top 10 finishes in the eight Kentucky races and he is definitely a driver to keep an eye on in Kentucky. Six of those top 10 finishes Busch finished inside the top five. He has also led 30 laps or more in five of the eight races run at Kentucky. The worst Busch has ever finished at Kentucky was 12th in 2016. Kyle led 163 laps in route to his win at the track in 2015. Kyle is definitely a driver to back at Kentucky Speedway.
Like Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr, Brad Keselowski has seen success at Kentucky Speedway on more than one occasion. These three drivers are part of a very small list, as only four drivers have won at Kentucky to this point. Keselowski stands atop the list as he has gone to victory lane three times at Kentucky. Brad’s wins at the track came in 2012, 2014 and 2016 respectively. He has six top 10 finishes and finished 3rd in last season’s race at Kentucky. He has led at least 38 laps in all but two of the Kentucky races. He is second behind Kyle Busch in laps led at the track with 521 laps led.
We start to get into the longshots for this week, and no better to start with a driver that has won as a longshot in the past. Chase Elliott has made three career cup series starts at Kentucky heading into this weekend’s race, and he like the rest of the Chevrolet’s haven’t tasted victory lane at the track yet. He also has only finished inside the top 10 once at the track. It was a 3rd place finish back in 2017, but he hasn’t shown that he could contend at this track yet. He will have a ways to go starting 20th this weekend, but there is still value in backing him because he has shown when he is counted out he can still prove doubters wrong.
Never thought that it would ever get to this point for Jimmie Johnson, being this much of a longshot as a seven-time series champion, but he is nonetheless. It’s understandable since he hasn’t won a race since 2017. Luckily Kentucky hasn’t been too hard on Johnson. He has five top 10 finishes at the track, but none since 2015. He finished 14th in last season’s Kentucky race. He finished 3rd in the inaugural Kentucky event in 2011, but his best since then was a 6th place finish in 2012. He was able to lead three laps in the race last season. Add in the fact he is coming off back-to-back top-five finishes including a third-place finish last week at Daytona and Johnson looks like he and Chevy, in general, has found something with their cars as Chevrolet has won two consecutive races. Chevy also finished first through fourth at Daytona. Jimmie is for sure a longshot, but still could be a contender Saturday night.
