WTR Fam! You voiced your opinion last season and we listened! Welcome to our new article for the 2024 season covering the Truck and Xfinity Series from a DFS strategy perspective. In this article, we will lay out past trends from previous relevant races, show the winning lineups for the flagship GPPs of those races, and give a high-level look at possible lineup construction based on this info and track type.
If you have not done so already, I would encourage you to read our NASCAR DFS Strategy Primer as this article will often piggyback on the strategies mentioned there. I will also say, as I mentioned in our primer, that these strategies are meant to be guardrails and not rules that are set in stone. Practice and Qualifying play a crucial role in dictating final strategy and builds. As this article is released mid-week, we encourage all members to check out our Discord for more discussions on strategy after the results of practice and qualifying are known.
Without further delay, let’s dive into Atlanta!
Race Info and Trends
Available Dominator Points
60.75 pts – Fastest Laps
33.75 pts – Laps Led
Lap Leaders
2023 – 9 Different Leaders
2022 – 10 Different Leaders
Fastest Laps
2023 – 22 Different Drivers, no more than 7 laps
2022 – 28 Different Drivers, no more than 10 laps
Cautions – 11, 7 – Avg. 9
DNFs – 6, 7 – Avg. 6.5
PD+FP Pts per Driver for Winning Lineup – Avg. 53.17
2023 – 54.67
2022 – 51.67
% of Laps Led per Race by Winning Lineup – Avg. 48.2%
2023 – 72.3% (99/137)
2022 – 23.7% (32/135)
% of Fastest Laps per Race by Winning Lineup – Avg. 30.5%
2023 – 37.7% (26/69)
2022 – 25.3% (24/95)
Available Dominator Points
73.35 pts – Fastest Laps
40.75 pts – Laps Led
Lap Leaders
2023-2 – 9 Different Leaders
2023-1 – 8 Different Leaders
2022-2 – 7 Different Leaders
2022-1 – 10 Different Leaders
Fastest Laps
2023-2 – 22 Different Drivers, no more than 13
2023-1 – 26 Different Drivers, no more than 9
2022-2 – 27 Different Drivers, no more than 12
2022-1 – 31 Different Drivers, no more than 9
Cautions – 8, 12, 6, 10 – Avg. 9
DNFs – 10, 12, 6, 8 – Avg. 9
PD+FP Pts per Driver for Winning Lineup – Avg. 47.92
2023-2 – 50.33
2023-1 – 44.17
2022-2 – 48.00
2022-1 – 49.17
% of Laps Led per Race by Winning Lineup – Avg. 50.1%
2023-2 – 47.3% (80/169)
2023-1 – 66.9% (109/163)
2022-2 – 62.6% (102/163)
2022-1 – 25.0% (43/172)
% of Fastest Laps per Race by Winning Lineup – Avg. 21.6%
2023-2 – 23.6% (26/110)
2023-1 – 22.6% (19/84)
2022-2 – 14.9% (20/134)
2022-1 – 26.7% (31/116)
Winning Flagship GPP Lineups
Trucks
Xfinity
Lineup Construction Strategy
Oh, Atlanta. The Intermediate track that thinks it’s a Superspeedway. Between the Summer race in 2021 and the Spring race in 2022, Atlanta went through a reconfiguration; increasing the degree of banking in the turns and adding progressive banking (meaning there is more banking in the turns the closer you get to the wall compared to the apron). This also meant no more worn-out, sandpaper-textured surface as the track was completely repaved. With the reconfiguration came changes to the engine and aero packages each series would run. While they both would run their Intermediate-style packages in the past, now they would be running their Intermediate-style aero and Superspeedway engine packages.
In some ways, Atlanta has become a Superspeedway from a DFS perspective. As was the case last week, and at all Daytona and Talladega Superspeedway races, Dominator points are practically a non-factor because they are spread out across more of the field and no one tends to separate themselves. This is partially true here, in the case of fastest laps. You can see from my notes above that there are always 20+ drivers that are credited with at least one fastest lap, and rarely do we get more than one or two drivers that break double-digits. But we have seen a different story with laps led. For both Truck races held on this new configuration, the top driver in laps lead found their way into the Top 6 DraftKings scorers and the top two laps lead drivers found their way into the winning Flagship GPP lineup in 2023 (one of them being John Hunter Nemechek, who was also a good place differential play). In Xfinity, it’s much of the same. In the last three races on this new configuration, we have seen one driver lead at least 73 laps and end up in the winning Flagship GPP lineup.
So, what do we do with this information and how do we approach building our lineups? In cash games, I believe you still have to play these races as if they were true Superspeedway races. We have had qualifying in each of the two trips here for the Truck series, while only last summer did the Xfinity cars have a chance to qualify, their first time doing so in four races on this configuration. Each race still presented us with good place differential opportunities and cash game ownership illustrates this as well. One other factor to consider for cash games, specifically in Xfinity, will be Austin Hill. If you haven’t been with the series for very long, you might not know that Hill and Superspeedway-style racing go together like Peanut Butter and Jelly. The man has dominated these style races during his time in the series and the DFS community has taken notice. He’s likely to have everyone’s attention again this weekend and the further back he starts the more popular he will be.
This leads me into tournament builds. Depending on where Hill starts can certainly shift how you approach your exposure. The more place differential upside he picks up by starting closer to the rear of the field, the harder it will likely become to fade him, regardless of ownership. I also like the idea of trying to plug in one to two drivers you think could rack up laps led. This could include drivers who have good track history here or on drafting, Superspeedway-style tracks in general, and are starting near the front. After that, it will be about building a pool of good place differential options as three or four of these drivers will likely be a must-have.
That’s all for this edition of Raceday Strategies for the Truck and Xfinity Series! I hope this helps everyone with their mindset as we approach building lineups for the Trucks and Xfinity races this weekend! One last time, these are high-level guardrails and not set-in-stone rules. We will have much more discussion in Discord as we lead up to lineup lock for these races. If you liked what you read or if you have feedback on how we can make this article better, please reach out to us. Good luck!
