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The 2024 Daytona 500 is finally here, and although there is rain in the forecast for Sunday, we're going to get this race in sooner or later. This race is the Super Bowl of the sport and one of the most prestigious to win. Races at Daytona are also wildly unpredictable, as pretty much anyone in the field could have a chance at winning on Sunday. Literally any driver.
When it comes to DraftKings and DFS, the approach you need to take for a race at Daytona is entirely different than most races. We will get into the strategy behind profiting at Daytona in this article, as well as the picks and projections. So let's go!
DraftKings has a $2,250,000 prize pool for the big GPP for this weekend's Daytona 500 with $1,000,000 going to first. Let's start breaking this down and see if a RotoBaller can grab the million!
Join the private RotoBaller DraftKings Daytona 500 contest by clicking here! Limited spots available.
Lineup Building Strategy at Superspeedways
Please take a little bit of time to study the above chart. It's a very simple visual representation of scoring with a finishing position on the left column and starting position on the top row. Dominator points are incredibly difficult to predict at Daytona (and not as concentrated as other "normal" races), we really have to focus on these two factors when building DraftKings lineups this weekend.
My main advice for most people when they ask me about Daytona DraftKings lineups is this: it's not about who you pick, it's about the strategy you use to build your lineup. As you can see above, it rarely pays off to take the drivers that start further up in the field. A driver who starts 40th and finishes 15th scores more base DraftKings FPTS than a driver who starts 10th and finishes second!
And don't forget, it's perfectly fine to let plenty of salary cap on the table. In fact, it's encouraged. The vast majority of the top lineups at Daytona on DraftKings routinely leave plenty of salary cap on the table. This weekend, I've built a lineup that I feel confident will cash with $11,000 of salary remaining.
Specific DFS Strategies for the Daytona 500
As I just mentioned, it's a good idea to analyze each Duel race and see if there is any strategy or correlation that could help shape your DraftKings lineup-building strategy. Below are a few of the things that I have noticed for the second Duel race:
- Avoid the top four starting spots. I'd take the top four starters out of your driver pool entirely. And if you want to get aggressive, I'd extend that down to the top seven starters along with Carson Hocevar, John Hunter Nemechek, and Harrison Burton. With drivers starting that high up, you need them to lead laps and win the race, and remember: nothing is guaranteed at Daytona. It's best to focus on place differential when building lineups.
- Find your leverage. This starting lineup is going to create a ton of leverage spots for you to try and exploit for an edge. Remember, Daytona is an extremely random race. Ryan Blaney and Kyle Busch are projected to be the highest-owned drivers on the slate. So why not go underweight on them in case they wreck? I would definitely consider that strategy. You can then shift that ownership down to the "lesser name" drivers starting in the high 30s (Hemric, Herbst, Alfredo, Gragson, for example) and try and gain leverage there. Those "lesser name" drivers have the same place differential upside as Blaney and Busch!
- Don't rely on projections and crank up the randomness. This race is not predictable, I don't care what anyone says. Profitability in DraftKings requires a solid lineup-building strategy (one that is focused on place differential) and a little bit of luck. I do my driver FPTS projections for this race, but in all honesty, I don't use them. Because it's unpredictable! What I do use is ownership percentage projections, though, to see where I can gain an edge on the rest of the DraftKings players.
Cash Game Driver Picks for Daytona
When it comes to cash games on DraftKings and the Daytona 500, you're focusing on place differential and that's it. I would recommend your entire cash game lineup be drivers that are starting 29th or worse in this race. Let's focus on three of my favorites this weekend, though.
Ryan Blaney ($9,800) - Ryan Blaney wrecked his No. 12 Ford during the Duel race on Thursday night, and because of that he has to go to a backup car and start from the rear for the Daytona 500. He is officially credited with a 32nd-place starting spot, which gives him plenty of room to move up and get place differential points. Blaney is one of the best superspeedway drivers in the field and has posted single-digit finishes in five of his last eight starts at Daytona in points-paying races, not to mention my algorithm has him projected to finish 4th.
Kyle Busch ($9,700) - Another driver that my algorithm has projected to finish very high is Kyle Busch, as it is has him 3rd heading into the Daytona 500. Rowdy starts back in 34th-place so, like Blaney, he has a lot of room for place differential points as well. Busch's record at Daytona isn't as strong as Blaney's, but over the last six races here, Kyle has the 4th-best average driver rating and he has three top-10 finishes in the four NextGen races here.
David Ragan ($6,500) - You can't get much safer than this. David Ragan is starting dead last in his No. 60 Ford for Roush-Fenway Keselowski Racing, which means it is impossible for him to score negative points in DraftKings. The only way for Ragan to go is up in this race...well, unless he finishes dead last, I guess. Ragan hasn't raced at Daytona since the 2022 season, but in three of his last four races at this track, he's walked away with top-10 finishes. He's a solid superspeedway racer.
Tournament Driver Picks for Daytona
Kyle Larson ($9,500) - I can't believe I'm writing this up. I've hated on Kyle Larson as a superspeedway racer for years, but I think this could be the year to strike in DFS. Larson starts back in 17th for this year's Daytona 500, but I have him projected at just 13.43% ownership. I think there's some leverage to gain there. Additionally, my algorithm is relatively high on Larson compared to how he typically performs at superspeedways. The No. 5 Chevrolet looked like it was able to be a strong pusher during the Duel race on Thursday night, and that will cause drivers to want to work with Larson in the 500.
AJ Allmendinger ($6,200) - I love being overweight on AJ Allmendinger here. He starts in that weird position of 28th and is sandwiched between several big-name drivers right above and below him in the starting lineup. However, Allmendinger has plenty of room for place differential starting that far back, and his record at superspeedways is actually quite impressive. Here at Daytona, Allmendinger has top-10 finishes in five of his last six starts and has ended up 21st or better in nine of his last ten.
Anthony Alfredo ($5,200) - I can't believe I'm writing up a driver starting in 39th-place as a tournament play at Daytona, but here we are. Anthony Alfredo is in the No. 62 Chevrolet for Beard Motorsports this weekend. Alfredo ran the 2021 Cup Series schedule for Front Row Motorsports before getting the boot, and Beard Motorsports really only tries to race superspeedway events nowadays. In other words, nobody is thinking about Anthony Alfredo... but he starts 39th... at Daytona... and has a top-10 finish to his credit back in 2021 at Talladega. I don't see any reason not to have 25%+ exposure of Fast Pasta this weekend. Here's your chance to get easy leverage on the rest of the DraftKings player field!
Late Add... 2:50 pm ET on February 18, 2024. I'm liking being overweight on the Stewart-Haas Racing Fords as well, particularly Chase Briscoe and Ryan Preece in tournaments. You can click here to read my analysis on Briscoe and click here to read my analysis on Preece.
Final notes... This is where it gets fun! There are so many drivers starting further back in the field that are going to go lower-owned in DraftKings than they should, simply because several "bigger name" drivers are starting in the back as well. I'd recommend going overweight on most, if not all of these drivers starting 26th or worse (in addition to the two listed above): Kaz Grala ($5,600), Corey Lajoie ($6,000), Todd Gilliland ($5,500), Riley Herbst ($5,100), Daniel Hemric ($5,300), and Noah Gragson ($6,300).
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DraftKings Driver Projections for the Daytona 500
You can click here to download the .csv file of these projections. Remember: the projections automatically loaded into the optimizer are NOT my projections. You need to replace.
| Driver | DK Salary | Proj DK Pts | Proj Own | Start Pos | Avg Proj Finish | $ Per FPT |
| Ryan Blaney | $9,800 | 60.53 | 42.41% | 32 | 08.8 | $162 |
| Kyle Busch | $9,700 | 57.62 | 33.24% | 34 | 10.2 | $168 |
| Martin Truex Jr | $8,200 | 50.77 | 24.95% | 27 | 12.5 | $162 |
| Austin Dillon | $7,300 | 48.37 | 25.77% | 33 | 15.8 | $151 |
| Bubba Wallace | $8,500 | 43.58 | 21.07% | 24 | 13.0 | $195 |
| Chris Buescher | $8,800 | 41.78 | 16.08% | 19 | 11.8 | $211 |
| Brad Keselowski | $9,000 | 41.35 | 16.96% | 16 | 10.0 | $218 |
| Denny Hamlin | $10,000 | 40.97 | 16.14% | 8 | 06.5 | $244 |
| Ricky Stenhouse Jr | $8,000 | 40.80 | 28.25% | 35 | 19.3 | $196 |
| Joey Logano | $9,200 | 38.70 | 12.35% | 1 | 08.5 | $238 |
| David Ragan | $6,500 | 38.37 | 29.48% | 40 | 23.3 | $169 |
| Corey LaJoie | $6,000 | 36.08 | 18.25% | 29 | 18.8 | $166 |
| Noah Gragson | $6,300 | 34.52 | 22.66% | 38 | 23.5 | $183 |
| Chase Elliott | $9,400 | 33.25 | 14.83% | 5 | 11.3 | $283 |
| Ryan Preece | $6,800 | 33.15 | 15.82% | 25 | 18.8 | $205 |
| Josh Berry | $6,600 | 32.42 | 17.13% | 30 | 21.2 | $204 |
| William Byron | $8,700 | 31.57 | 16.92% | 18 | 15.2 | $276 |
| AJ Allmendinger | $6,200 | 31.15 | 16.91% | 28 | 21.3 | $199 |
| Kyle Larson | $9,500 | 30.92 | 13.43% | 17 | 15.7 | $307 |
| Ross Chastain | $8,100 | 30.62 | 16.92% | 21 | 17.0 | $265 |
| Anthony Alfredo | $5,200 | 29.75 | 16.70% | 39 | 26.8 | $175 |
| Ty Gibbs | $7,400 | 29.13 | 9.31% | 15 | 15.3 | $254 |
| Daniel Hemric | $5,300 | 29.02 | 16.94% | 37 | 25.7 | $183 |
| Christopher Bell | $8,300 | 28.73 | 6.99% | 4 | 10.8 | $289 |
| Austin Cindric | $7,000 | 28.47 | 4.89% | 6 | 12.7 | $246 |
| Jimmie Johnson | $7,700 | 28.07 | 8.98% | 23 | 19.2 | $274 |
| Todd Gilliland | $5,500 | 26.92 | 15.62% | 31 | 24.2 | $204 |
| Riley Herbst | $5,100 | 25.40 | 13.63% | 36 | 28.0 | $201 |
| Chase Briscoe | $7,100 | 24.90 | 13.39% | 20 | 19.3 | $285 |
| Justin Haley | $5,700 | 24.90 | 11.43% | 22 | 20.3 | $229 |
| Erik Jones | $7,600 | 24.52 | 9.56% | 11 | 15.5 | $310 |
| Daniel Suarez | $6,900 | 16.82 | 8.67% | 13 | 20.3 | $410 |
| Tyler Reddick | $7,800 | 13.87 | 4.93% | 3 | 17.8 | $563 |
| Michael McDowell | $7,200 | 12.42 | 5.15% | 2 | 18.5 | $580 |
| Alex Bowman | $7,500 | 10.03 | 7.63% | 7 | 21.3 | $748 |
| Kaz Grala | $5,600 | 09.75 | 10.75% | 26 | 30.2 | $574 |
| Harrison Burton | $5,400 | 08.72 | 4.11% | 12 | 24.0 | $620 |
| John H. Nemechek | $6,400 | 07.52 | 4.54% | 10 | 23.8 | $851 |
| Zane Smith | $5,800 | 01.57 | 3.10% | 14 | 27.7 | $3,702 |
| Carson Hocevar | $5,900 | 01.43 | 3.15% | 9 | 26.5 | $4,116 |
| JJ Yeley | $5,000 | 00.00 | 0.52% | DNQ | N/A | $0 |
| BJ McLeod | $5,000 | 00.00 | 0.44% | DNQ | N/A | $0 |
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