NASCAR Sprint Cup - Banking 500 Preview

NASCAR Banking 500 Preview

What better race to earn some cash with NASCAR betting than the Banking 500? The Chase for the Cup moves to Lowe's Motor Speedway with just six races remaining on the year. Lowe's is a 1.5-mile quad oval with a short front stretch that seems to catapult the cars out of Turn No. 4 and on to the finish line.

They could also name this track Jimmie Johnson's house, with the No. 48 car serving its sponsor well on its home turf. Johnson has five checkered flags in 16 career starts in Concord, North Carolina. However, his last victory came back in 2006 and he has since finished inside the Top 10 in just two of his last seven races there. He's posted back-to-back 13th-place showings during events there in May but is coming off a win at the Pepsi 500 last weekend and has finished in front in two of his last three races. Johnson leads the Sprint Cup standings and is a +120 favorite to win his fourth championship in a row.

Johnson's teammate Mark Martin is also among the notables for this weekend. The No. 5 team is sitting in second in the Chase standings, in hot pursuit of his first career Cup title. NASCAR betting odds have him at +200 to win the Chase championship. Last week, Martin started in ninth and moved up for a fourth-place finish – marking his seventh straight Top 10 showing. In 49 starts at Lowe's, Martin has just two wins and an average finish of just under 19. His most recent running there was indicative of that, finishing 17th at the Coca-Cola 500 in May, but he did have back-to-back Top 10s in the two races before that.

Johnson and Martin's Hendrick Motorsports teammate, Jeff Gordon, is fifth in the points standings following a second-place finish in California last Sunday. That was Gordon's second straight runner-up showing and puts him back in the Chase after a slow start found him in the bottom half of competitors. The No. 24 car has run 33 times at North Carolina, finishing in front five times – most recently in 2007.  However, in his last five races there he has cracked the Top 10 twice and posted an average finish of 12th. Gordon is currently priced at +800 to win his fifth Cup championship.

Also among the favorites for this weekend are Tony Stewart and Juan Montoya. Stewart is ranked fourth in the standings and is at +800 to claim the Cup title. Montoya, who sits in third, is listed at +350 in the NASCAR betting odds after finishing third at the Pepsi 500 last Sunday. That finish was Montoya's fourth Top 5 finish in a row. The native of Columbia has only raced at Lowe's five times since making the jump from CART. He has just one Top 10 and an average finish of over 30th in those events.

Stewart, on the other hand, is a little more familiar with Concord. He's taken to Lowe's 21 times in his career and has finished with one win and 11 Top 10 showing in that span. Stewart is coming off a fifth-place running at California last Sunday, despite a speeding penalty, and has placed inside the Top 10 in his last three events. The No. 14 car had success at Kansas two weeks ago, winning the Price Chopper 400. Lowe's is set up very similar to Kansas and could be ripe for the picking for the Burger King pitchman.