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Who's ready for some road course action??? While the Cup Series and Truck Series are up in Michigan this weekend, Xfinity's taking a little jaunt over to Wisconsin to race at Road America.
Road course racing is always fun, especially when one of the two top road course racers in the series is starting way back in 33rd place. Hi, A.J. Allmendinger! Of course, with Austin Cindric starting second, this race could a run-away for the 22 car.
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Austin Cindric #22 ($11,000) - Starting 2nd
Look, I really wanted to recommend A.J. Allmendinger and Austin Cindric, but you're not going to be able to build a lineup with both of them. (I mean, you could, but you'd be taking a LOT of dart throws to make it happen.
Anyway, Allmendinger's place differential upside is important, but I like Cindric's "lead a bunch of laps because he's a great road racer starting on the front row."
A two-time road course winner in Xfinity, Cindric doesn't have a Road America win, but he did lead four laps and finished second to Christopher Bell in this race last year. Cindric's the best road racer of the series regulars, and Saturday's race is almost guaranteed to see him lead some laps. The big question: in a 45 lap race, are those laps led going to lead to more DFS points than A.J. Allmendinger's place differential will lead to?
Andy Lally #02 ($10,300) - Starting 23rd
We're hitting up the road ringers immediately here. Andy Lally hasn't run an Xfinity race since 2018, but between 2016 and 2018, he ran five races and recorded three top 10s.
Lally's a great road racer, so it's good for Our Motorsports that Brett Moffitt had to be in Michigan this week so they could throw Lally in this car. Though inconsistent all year, the 02 team has top 15 speed at times. Add Lally's road racing skills to the mix, and this could be a really strong race.
In three Xfinity starts at this track, Lally's recorded two top 10s and a worst finish of 15th. Starting 23rd, Lally has a good bit of place differential upside, and while his price reflects that upside a slight bit more than I might like, I think Lally's upside is still worth a DFS play. I mean...he once drove a Bobby Dotter car to a seventh-place finish at this track!
Jeremy Clements #51 ($9,000) - Starting 18th
Clements is a really underrated road racer. Sure, this 51 car's not that good, but his lone Xfinity win came here at Road America in 2017, and in this year's only road course race so far, he finished 13th, while his average finish overall is 17.3.
But let's talk more about Road America in particular. Clements has nine starts here. A lot of the early ones here weren't great, but as the 51 team has improved, so have the finishes. Since 2017, he's finished first, 13th, and eighth here. I know starting 18th is slightly worrisome when it comes to a team like Clements's team, but based on recent runs here, he's worth the potential risk.
Preston Pardus #36 ($7,000) - Starting 37th
Preston Pardus starts last. In his only other Xfinity start this year at the Indianapolis road course, he finished 10th.
I don't really know what else to say here. No, the 36 team isn't good, but we have a road course guy starting last on Saturday. You have to play him. Too much place differential upside. He didn't finish this race last year after suspension issues, but he qualified 15th for it in a Dan Pardus car that shouldn't have qualified that well. Pardus might end up being a chalk play this week, but it's good chalk.
Scott Heckert #78 ($6,200) - Starting 27th
Yep, another road course guy. Look, you don't have to play them all, but I figure it's good to at least tell you about who they all are this week.
Heckert has eight Xfinity starts with no top 10s, but six of those starts were on road courses, and in those six starts, he has a pair of top 20 finishes , including a 13th at Watkins Glen last year.
This 78 car is not not not one of the "good" mid-pack cars. Vinnie Miller has piloted it to an average finish of 24.6, and if we round that up to 25th, there's not enough place differential upside there for me to like a Vinnie Miller piloted 78.
But Miller's not in it! Heckert is! He's won three K&N Pro Series road course races. He's taken 20th place McLeod cars in K&N to top 10s at road courses. He's really good at this kind of track, which makes up for some issues with the car itself not having a lot of speed.
Brandon Brown #68 ($5,900) - Starting 13th
We end with Brandon Brown.
Brown starts 13th. He's still got a really cool stat going, which is that in every race he's actually finshed, he hasn't finished worse than 14th. This is a really solid car.
Brown's not a road course ringer like other guys I recommended, but he's mostly run fine on this type of track. There are higher ceiling guys you could take, but I think at this price, I'll take the safety of Brandon Brown and his top 15 speed.
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