As spring arrives and nature begins anew after the dark and cold of winter, short tracks across the United States are opening for the start of their 2022 racing seasons. Which makes it quite appropriate that the NASCAR Cup Series is choosing this time to revisit its drivers’ roots with three-straight races on short tracks.
This weekend, the NASCAR Cup Series begins its springtime short track stretch with a trip to Richmond Raceway in Richmond, Virginia for the Toyota Owners 400. Since opening in 1946, Richmond has long been one of the premier short tracks in the state of Virginia, from its days as a half-mile at the state fairgrounds to its present day 0.75-mile D-shaped configuration. The list of winners at Richmond features many of NASCAR’s greatest stars, from Richard Petty to Bobby Allison, Dale Earnhardt to Jeff Gordon, and now modern-day stars like Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson.
How to watch NASCAR Cup Series at Richmond
- Date: April 3
- Location: Richmond Raceway – Henrico County, Virginia
- Time: 3:30 p.m. ET
- TV: Fox
- Stream: fuboTV (try for free)
What to watch
- The generational scales in NASCAR have well and truly tilted in favor of the sports’ youth. Since the fall of last year, a NASCAR record 12-straight races have been won by a driver under the age of 30, four of which won for the very time in their Cup careers. That streak continued last weekend at Circuit of the Americas with Ross Chastain breaking through for his first career win.
With Austin Cindric, Chase Briscoe, and Chastain all having won for the very first time this season, all eyes have quickly turned to who could be next. Tyler Reddick has come very close to his first win already this season, as has Daniel Suarez. But every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and in this case, it’s those over the age of 30 trying to get back in Victory Lane.
Drivers who have been fixtures in the win column for many years now suddenly find themselves burdened with trying to keep up with their younger competition. For 41-year olds Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr., things aren’t so bad — their winless streaks are 15 and 14 races in length respectively. For 36-year old Kyle Busch and 46-year old Kevin Harvick, there’s much more concern. Busch has not won since Pocono last year, and enters this weekend on a 23-race winless drought. Harvick’s last win came at Bristol in the fall of 2020, and he’s now up to 49 races without a win.
- Over the course of the past decade, Richmond has been a great place to drive a Toyota. Since 2009, the automaker has won 15 of 25 races at Richmond, including streaks of five, three, and four wins in a row. Given that, the Toyota brigade is likely hoping that Richmond is the cure for all that currently ails them.
None of the six Toyota teams have had a particularly strong start to 2022, and a Toyota has not visited Victory Lane since Bubba Wallace won at Talladega last fall. Fortunately, Toyota’s drivers are among the best at Richmond. Martin Truex Jr. has won three out of the last five races at Richmond, while Kyle Busch leads all active drivers with six Richmond wins overall. Denny Hamlin also has three wins at Richmond, and Kurt Busch has won here twice.
- There was a time where Richmond offered your typical bump-and-grind, root-and-gouge, knock ’em up the groove and out of the way brand of short track racing — which led to a lot of cautions and a lot of attrition. But over the past several years, the racing at Richmond has become much cleaner. There have been no more than five cautions in each race at Richmond since the fall of 2018, with as few as three on two separate occasions.
Some of that was attributable to previous generations of Cup cars, which were sensitive to turbulent air in traffic and also had lots of side force to help straighten cars out when they got sideways. But with less side force and less aerodynamic sensitivity, races with the Next Gen car have featured plenty of cautions throughout the season: Each race in 2022 has featured no fewer than seven cautions, with the yellow flag coming out more than 10 times in half the races so far.
Pick to win
(Odds via Caesars Sportsbook)
Martin Truex Jr. (+850): If you’re going to bet on the Under 30 streak continuing, Tyler Reddick is your best bet at +1500 odds. But if you want to bank on the streak being snapped and a veteran driver taking the checkered flag, Martin Truex Jr. is an easy pick. Truex has won three of the last five races at Richmond, has six-straight top 5s here dating back to 2018, and he’s been arguably the most consistent veteran driver this season with three top 10s and five finishes inside the top 15. If Truex and crew chief James Small can hit on the setup and get in their groove quickly, the rest of the field is going to have their work cut out for them on Sunday.