Matt Selz
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It’s time to Go Bowling at The Glen on Sunday! Watkins Glen comes with just two races left in the NASCAR Cup Series regular season and a lot up for grabs in the playoff chase. The speedy layout of Watkins Glen can provide a lot of drama and perhaps a new winner on the season. With Daytona being the regular season finale this is the last chance to have a “more” standard race determine a win at The Glen. What does all that mean for betting? How can we approach the early betting lines for Sunday? Who are we predicting to win and get Top-10s at Watkins Glen? All that and more is below.
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Watkins Glen Track Layout
The famed road course in upstate New York, in the Finger Lakes region is always a challenge when the NASCAR Cup Series comes to town. It’s perhaps the fastest road course on the schedule year in and year out with elevation changes that can help carry speed through a lap. NASCAR uses the “Short Course” configuration for the Go Bowling at The Glen which makes the track 2.45 miles per lap with 11 turns including the Bus Stop chicane. This layout has a couple of long straights, the famed uphill esses, and a long looping right-hander before getting back to the downhill front stretch. Perhaps the oddest thing about the layout is the reverse pit road that has cars being serviced with the passenger side closest to pit wall rather than the driver side. This is similar to what they did at Indy Road last weekend but different than all other tracks.
Betting Strategies For Go Bowling at The Glen
The Glen, as it’s colloquially called, is a relatively straight forward road layout. As mentioned above, it’s a fast course with some elevation changes but not a lot of technical corners. That means that the fast cars that weekend are the ones that typically show up and do well in the race, assuming they keep it clean on pit road. We’ve seen our fair share of aggressive moves made here as the higher speed corners invite that as does the decent amount of run off. What we saw last week at Indy Road is likely to be what we see a repeat of on Sunday, a lot of Green Flag laps. At Indy Road, nearly the entire race was run under green and with 90 laps on tap on Sunday, get ready for more.
What does that mean for betting? We should be looking at the cars that are the fastest over lap averages in Saturday’s practice session and not just give preferential treatment to cars starting further up the grid. We can also look at the faster, less-technical road courses over the last two years and see what drivers have been consistently quick and finishing well. That should give us a good basis for our bets this week. The lack of stage cautions will help playoff drivers looking for a win to get in based on strategy.
NASCAR Go Bowling at the Glen 2023 Winner Best Bets
Chase Elliott (+350 at FanDuel)
I mean it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to put this one in the winner predictions. He has the most road course wins of anyone in the Cup Series including his first Cup win coming at The Glen. Elliott was fast at the Indy Road Course and he stated his team has put more effort into the car for Watkins Glen. That has to mean something too right?
Kyle Larson (+600 at DraftKings)
Are we in line for a three-peat at Watkins Glen for Larson? This has been a great track for him in the past and he’s been fast, though unlucky, at road courses this year. He is looking to get back on the right foot heading into the playoffs, and what better place to do that than at a place Larson’s had so much success at?
Daniel Suarez (+1200 at DraftKings)
Suarez won at Sonoma a year ago and that chassis was fast at Chicago before being fast again at Indy Road. The only reason he didn’t finish better at Indy Road was a bad pit stop at an inopportune time. That’s unlikely to happen again. Watkins Glen is Suarez’s best chance to fully lock himself into the playoffs rather than leaving it up to chaos at Daytona.
Michael McDowell (+1300 at BetMGM)
Fresh off a win at Indy Road, it’s hard to look past a guy who’s as accomplished on road courses as McDowell. While it’s hard to compare road courses to each other, Watkins Glen is in some respects similar to Indy Road. They are on the less technical side of the spectrum and more on the faster side of things which should play to McDowell’s ability even more.
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Best Prop Bets For Go Bowling at The Glen
Austin Dillon Top-10 Finish (+750 at Caesars)
Dillon has been running better on road courses of late and has nabbed a top-10 finish 20-percent of the time on them in the last two years with a P11 as well not counted. The speed has been getting better at this discipline too as the Green Flag Speed at Indy Road a week ago suggests despite a mediocre finish. This is a good value at a track that Dillon can surprise at.
Chase Elliott Top-3 Finish (+105 at BetRivers)
I mean, he’s going to be in the mix for the win, so why not get a plus money return on him not quite sealing the deal? He finished P2 at Indy Road a week ago and was closing in on McDowell in the closing laps which figures to have him in line for a similar showing again this weekend at Watkins Glen.
Christopher Bell Top-5 Finish (+190 at BetMGM)
Bell has been fast at road courses and is coming off a good showing at Indy Road. While it’s tempting to take him to win at +1400, the top-5 prop is a bit of a hedge in case he doesn’t quite have that top end race winning speed we’ve seen from him at previous road courses.
Ross Chastain Top-10 Finish (+195 at FanDuel)
It’s been a bit of a rough go of it lately for Chastain, but he still ran well at Sonoma a few road races ago. His teammates, including Shane Van Gisbergen, have had speed at both Chicago and Indy Road and I don’t believe Chastain is far off. If he can put together a complete race weekend, there’s no reason he can’t be a threat for a top-10 finish come Sunday afternoon.
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