After the historic 67th running of the Daytona 500, NASCAR now fully dives into their season with the second race of the year at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Now a hybrid super-speedway, the ATL is seen as one of the more unpredictable tracks on the schedule, and how ironic it comes right after the chaos that ensued in Daytona Beach, FL.
Who do we watch out for in Sunday’s race? Well, Ford hasn’t proven yet that anybody can beat them on raw speed. Ryan Blaney sits on pole, but its Austin Cindric who starts second that everyone will be keeping an eye on. The driver of the No. 2 has led countless laps at super-speedways in the last year, including the most recent visit to Atlanta although it was won by his teammate Joey Logano.
By that very paragraph alone, you may believe Penske is the frontrunners to collect the checkered flag, and you may be right. But don’t count out the drivers starting eighth and ninth for RFK Racing, Chris Buescher and Brad Keselowski. Ryan Preece, who flipped just seven days ago, starts 11th.
Kyle Busch, winner of the Craftsman Truck Series race on Saturday afternoon, looks for redemption on Sunday and is also the highest starting non-Ford in sixth place.
While we can go through all of our top candidates, the unpredictability of these types of races only leaves us to believe any of the 39 drivers in the event can win at the conclusion of 260+ laps.
The Ambetter Health 400 takes place at 3:00PM ET, live on FOX.
