Us Yahoo! Fantasy NASCAR players got a little bit of a break this weekend in the form of seeing practice before locking down–although we didn’t make any changes from our initial picks. With that being said, that can sometimes come back to bite you in the ass because you go against your gut feeling (it’s happened to us more than once this season). Still, it was nice to have an idea of the fastest cars before finalizing our roster this week, although it should be noted that the fastest cars don’t always finish up front here at Sonoma. There’s added pressure on the crew chiefs this weekend, not to mention the fact that the drivers have to deal with making left and right turns on Sunday. It should be a crazy race this week, and let’s not forget that next up we have the second Daytona race.
Looking back at Michigan, the Fantasy Racing Online Yahoo! team actually had a pretty nice score (310 points) despite having Chase Elliott–who finished 2nd–on the bench. As we near the halfway point of the season, our team is sitting in the 50th percentile, which is less than ideal, but we’re confident that we can make up ground moving forward.
Yahoo! A Group Pick and Final Rankings for Sonoma
Our pick for this whole week has been Kurt Busch in the A Group and we’re sticking with it. When you combine the notion that he is on pace to have the best season (average finish-wise) of his career, as well as the fact that he is one of the best road course racers in the Sprint Cup garage, it just makes sense. Kurt Busch wasn’t blazing fast on the speed charts during the practice sessions on Friday but the races at Sonoma are won by cars that have good speed over a long run, not just one lap. Kurt Busch likes his #41 Chevrolet this weekend and has four top 5 finishes in the last five Sonoma race. Game, set, match, we’re starting Kurt Busch this weekend with Brad Keselowski on the bench.
As far as the other A Group drivers, Jimmie Johnson is one of the safest bets here at Sonoma and should be in the running for a top 5. The same goes for Kevin Harvick, although his record here isn’t as stellar as Johnson’s seven-straight top 10s, plus Harvick’s bad qualifying effort continued on Saturday. Joey Logano should be a top 10 threat, and we still think Brad Keselowski is one to keep an eye on this weekend. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. has a great race car for this Sunday’s event and he has been one of the better road course racers over the last couple of years. And the Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas all have plenty of speed in their race cars here at Sonoma but none of them have a great history at this race track. Kyle Busch is probably going to be a contender on Sunday, but his terrible string of finishes lately is concerning.
Final A Group Rankings: (1) Kurt Busch, (2) Jimmie Johnson, (3) Joey Logano, (4) Dale Earnhardt, Jr., (5) Kevin Harvick, (6) Kyle Busch, (7) Brad Keselowski, (8) Matt Kenseth, (9) Denny Hamlin
Yahoo! B Group Picks and Final Rankings for Sonoma
There’s so many solid sleeper options in the B Group this weekend that it makes for an excellent week to start save. We didn’t even think about putting any of the “best” B Group drivers on our roster this weekend, as we were more than satisfied rolling with A.J. Allmendinger, Clint Bowyer, Tony Stewart, and Kasey Kahne. The thing about a race like Sonoma, though, is that there are so many variables going on and so many sleepers to choose from that it’s difficult to choose just one.
A.J. Allmendinger is one of the best road course racers in the Sprint Cup garage, and, in our opinion, really races the best when he flies under the radar–and that’s exactly what he did on Friday during the two practice sessions. The Dinger never really put down a blazing fast lap in either session, but he had a pretty good average lap time in that first practice and we think that’s a good sign heading into race day. Allmendinger has arguably had one of the top 3 race cars here at Sonoma over the last two years but hasn’t been able to get the finish. Will this weekend finally be the one where he comes home with his first top 5 in wine country? We hope so, and we’re starting him.
Choosing our second starter in the B Group is a little more difficult. Right off the bat we’re going to eliminate Kasey Kahne, though. He has three straight top 10 finishes here at Sonoma, but he hasn’t blown us away this weekend and we may need him down the stretch to make the math work on starts. So it’s down to Clint Bowyer or Tony Stewart.
Sonoma is Bowyer’s best track on the circuit and he has an average finish of 8.6 in his ten career starts here. However, he’s in junk equipment this season, and that has to be noted. Skill plays a huge role in the races here at Sonoma but you have to make sure your car stays together, too. Tony Stewart, on the other hand, has shown good speed as of late and is always considered a threat when the Sprint Cup Series stops at a road course. The safer route is to go with the #14 Chevrolet on Sunday, but the #15 Chevrolet has the potential to earn more points on race day. All things considered, because he qualified better, Tony Stewart is probably going to be our B Group starter alongside A.J. Allmendinger at Sonoma.
Looking at the rest of the B Group drivers, Carl Edwards has a great car this weekend and has truly been one of the better road course drivers over the last couple of years. He won the 2014 race here at Sonoma and has top 5 potential this weekend, but we think he’s much too valuable at other track types to start here on Sunday. Jamie McMurray is a nice option this weekend who showed consistent speed over the two practice sessions on Friday and has ended up 11th and 4th in the last two Sonoma races. Also we can’t forget about his teammate, Kyle Larson, who has looked just as impressive. It honestly wouldn’t surprise us if he Larson somehow got to victory lane here on Sunday, as we all know it’s not uncommon for a “surprise” victor to emerge. Martin Truex, Jr. has a very fast race car in Sonoma but has been in a slump as of late (excluding Charlotte) and doesn’t really have a consistent record at this track. Like Edwards, we wouldn’t waste a Truex start on Sunday, either.
Final B Group Rankings: (1) Carl Edwards, (2) A.J Allmendinger, (3) Martin Truex, Jr., (4) Kyle Larson, (5) Tony Stewart, (6) Clint Bowyer, (7) Jamie McMurray, (8) Paul Menard, (9) Kasey Kahne, (10) Ryan Newman, (11) Casey Mears, (12) Austin Dillon, (13) Greg Biffle, (14) Danica Patrick, (15) Aric Almirola, (16) Trevor Bayne, (17) Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.
Yahoo! C Group Pick and Final Rankings for Sonoma
If we could go back to Friday evening and re-do it all, we would have chose different C Group drivers. We decided to go with the safe route early on this week and put Chase Elliott and Ryan Blaney on our Yahoo! team for Sonoma. The thing is, neither of them looked very sporty during the two practice sessions on Friday, and it was actually a couple of other C Group drivers that stole the show in terms of “underdog” plays for Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350. We had Michael McDowell as one of our deep, deep sleepers this weekend, and he showed plenty of promise during practice this weekend. He qualified 20th for Sunday’s race as well. It’s hard to trust a guy like that but if you’re in ultra start save mode right now, he’s probably your best bet. He ran 24th in the 2014 Sonoma race. We also thought Brian Scott looked decent in that #44 Ford this weekend, and he starts 22nd. As far as our two selections, it looks like Chase Elliott has gotten acclimated to this track a little quicker than Ryan Blaney, and the #24 Chevrolet starts better than the #21 Ford on Sunday, so we’re going with Chase this weekend–a move we will probably regret when we run out of starts later this year.
Final C Group Rankings: (1) Chase Elliott, (2) Ryan Blaney, (3) Brian Scott, (4) Michael McDowell, (5) David Ragan, (6) Landon Cassill, (7) Regan Smith, (8) Chris Buescher, (9) Patrick Carpentier, the rest
