Welcome NASCAR fans and DFS players alike! It’s the start of the 2021 NASCAR season and the season kicks off with the Busch Clash on Tuesday night at 7 pm ET. It’s an exhibition race consisting of 35 laps around the 3.5-mile road course at Daytona International Speedway with a competition caution coming on lap 15.

With these few laps in the race, laps led won’t be a major source of points, but it’s still worth focusing on as it can be tough to pass at this track as we saw last year when they ran it for the first time. So finding the guys that can move up well to mix with those drivers that can hold their spots up toward the front is the best way to attack roster-building for this race. With about half as many drivers in the field as a normal race, you can afford to get a couple more high-priced drivers in the lineup and still fit solid value plays without much of a concern for budget.

For this race, we’ll focus on drivers that are good at road courses specifically and more specifically drivers that have done well at Roval type courses (a.k.a the Charlotte Roval and this track last year). While every road course is different, the similarities of having to do the NASCAR oval and the infield sections make these two tracks good comparisons. That being said we won’t really talk about previous Clash performances because the previous editions of the Clash have been run on the Daytona oval and not a road course and resembled more of what we’ll see on Sunday rather than what we’ll see Tuesday night. Also, one final thing to keep in mind is that they are racing this same track a week after the Daytona 500 for a points-paying race and so this is essentially a free practice session for these 21 teams.

If you are unsure of some terms used in this piece, check out the Cup Series Primer that’s a free read as well.

Chase Elliott ($10,500 DK, $13,000 FD) Starting 7th

Elliott is quite simply the best road course racer in the Cup series at the moment having won four straight at the discipline and five of the last six including at this track last year and back-to-back Roval races. Let's not forget that he also just ran the Rolex 24-Hour of Daytona a couple of weeks ago and even went back in the car for the final 10 minutes of the race, for the fourth time, to get some extra practice on the layout. He’s starting P7 which gives him a great shot to move up and get you potentially a win along with some laps led and nice position differential.

Martin Truex Jr ($10,000 DK, $12,500 FD) Starting 18th

If Elliott is the top road racer, Truex is the second-best having won three of the last eight races and was dethroned by Elliott. He started P3 at this track last year and finished there for a third top-10 in the last three Roval races. Starting P18 gives him a lot of position differential upside on Tuesday and he’ll need to move up to hit value. While we’re not expecting full 5x value for some drivers, since it’s such a short race, if he finishes P6 or better he’ll hit value just from finish position points and PD without having to get any dominator points (fastest laps or laps led) which makes him quite enticing and also likely quite popular to play.

Denny Hamlin ($9,600 DK, $12,000 FD) Starting 3rd

Hamlin finished second to Elliott here in the points race last year and is a sneaky consistent road racer of late. Like I said on the podcast for the Clash, if you want a high-quality play who won’t be as popular as the two above him on the salary list, Hamlin is your guy. He’s been able to run up front and lead just over five laps a race in the last three Roval type races so at this price point he’s worth the shot on lower draft percentage for a guy who can lead as many laps as the two in front of him and finish highly as well.

Kyle Busch ($8,900 DK, $10,500 FD) Starting 16th

So here’s the thing, and I alluded to it in the podcast, Busch is a risky play this week to be sure. Not only is he starting this year with a new Crew Chief but he’s also coming off a very rough season in 2020 as perhaps there was no one more affected by having no practices for most of the season and he’s historically not been great at these types of tracks as he’s posted an average finish of 34.7 in the last three. So why is he in the playbook? Well, he’s wanting to get 2021 off on a good foot and his starting spot is intriguing if he can manage to not crash in this one. He’s a risky play to be certain and only fits GPP builds but at sub-9K on DK, it might be the cheapest we see him for a while. 

Ryan Blaney ($8,600 DK, $11,000 FD) Starting 1st

So truth be told Blaney was in the playbook before the draw happened and put him on the pole randomly. Now he’s going to be the most popular driver to play on Tuesday. Blaney got off to a great start last year with a shot at winning three of the first four races but then things trailed off for him a bit. Now he’s up front for a short road race and keep in mind that he won the first race at the Roval, granted Truex was spun out on the last corner, and he’s finished top-10 in the other two Roval races. At this price point with a shot to lead all of the laps until the competition caution, it’s hard to pass up on Blaney.

Joey Logano ($8,100 DK, $8,500 FD) Starting 10th

Logano has the fourth-best average finish in the last three Roval races and one of four drivers with three top-10s in that span. Logano got off to a great start last year winning two of the first four races and has been a quick starter each of the last few years so we shouldn’t really expect anything different here especially with him getting to run a track he had a top-10 at last year. Don’t expect to see Logano this cheap much longer, especially on Sunday, so now’s a good time to get him in a lineup.

Alex Bowman ($7,900 DK, $9,000 FD) Starting 2nd

Bowman started P27 here last year and finished P12 showing he clearly knows how to make his way around this layout. He’s now starting on the outside pole which gives him a shot to stay up front and lead laps if he gets good jumps on restarts. For what it’s worth the Hendrick horsepower typically does well around the Daytona oval and if he can harness that properly, he could be the fastest car on the track at times. We don’t know how he’ll react to being in the famed 48-car for the first time but why not get his feet wet in an exhibition race at a discipline he’s been good at recently with the fifth-best average finish in the last three roval type races. 

William Byron ($7,700 DK, $9,500 FD) Starting 5th

Here’s an interesting fact, in the last three roval type races, Byron has the second-best average driver rating in the field and not just the Clash field but every driver with at least one race run. He’s posted three top-10s and an average finish of 6.7 with a 114.5 driver rating which bests Truex’s 111.1 mark and is second only to his teammate Chase Elliott who won all three races. Byron moved up five spots in two of those three races as well and has led an average of 16.7 laps a race. Squarely in the mid-tier on both sites, he’s a great play who might be a bit overlooked given the guys starting behind him and the pole sitter.

Kurt Busch ($7,400 DK, $8,000 FD) Starting 15th

The elder Busch brother has been pretty consistent at these tracks the last couple of years including finishing P4 at the Charlotte Roval last October. He’s not sexy and doesn’t have the upside that others possess but he has a good floor that can boost a lineup, especially at this price point. He should be able to nab a top-10 finish and if he does that it’s 5x pretty easily and because of the lack of major upside, he may be overlooked as well.

Matt DiBenedetto ($6,900 DK, $7,500 FD) Starting 12th

DiBenedetto is an unsung road racer but some of his best drives in the Cup series have come in the discipline. He’s posted a couple of top-15s in the last three roval races and if he simply finishes P11 on Tuesday he nearly hits 5x while once again getting off to a good start while he’s continuing to race for a ride after this season.

Aric Almirola ($6,600 DK, $7,500 FD) Starting 21st

Almirola wasn’t originally in the playbook because his history isn’t great on these tracks and finishing P24 here last year. However, then the draw happened and he is starting dead last, giving him free position differential. The catch is that he’s likely to be a popular play since he’s cheap and literally can’t go backward. There is a risk since he’s not had the best luck at these places and he’ll still need to finish top-15 to hit value.

Chris Buescher ($5,900 DK, $7,000 FD) Starting 13th

Do you know who finished fifth at the race here last year? That’s right it was Buescher and he started P21 in that effort. Now he starts P13 and should be able to rattle off another top-10 finish without much trouble which is way too hard to pass up at less than 6K on DK and min price (for this race) on FD. The cat is a bit out of the bag on Buescher though in terms of how good he was down the stretch last year and how good he was at road courses last year and with his price he allows to get a third high-priced driver in a lineup too.

Cole Custer ($5,800 DK, $7,000 FD) Starting 8th

Need a sneaky top-10 candidate? Custer is just that. He finished P9 at the Roval last year after starting in the mid-20s and he finished the season pretty well as well with four top-15s in the last five races of 2020. His price is so good that even sliding back three spots still hits value but holding his spot pays 6x. If you need to go down this low Custer and Buescher are the two best options this cheap.