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Carrie Stroup here with your SpongeBob SquarePants 400 betting odds for this weekend courtesy of our friends at Sportsbook.ag.
Kansas Speedway – Kansas City, KS
Sportsbook.ag Odds to Win Race
The drivers head to Kansas Speedway this week for the newly anointed SpongeBob SquarePants 400; formally the STP 400 and 5-Hour Energy 400. Kansas Speedway grabbed a second date at its venue in 2011 and four different racers have earned a victory in those years with the Joe Gibbs racing team getting two of those. Jeff Gordon was the winner at the event last year, running the slowest race (3:07:31) for a victor in the four years of its existence.
This one will be held under the lights at the 1.5-mile asphalt course which features 17 20-degree turns and also hosts the Hollywood Casino 400 in the Chase for the Cup in October. Last week, NASCAR was able to witness an exciting matchup of legendary racers as the trio of Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon all led for at least 47 laps each with Earnhardt Jr. winning in Talladega for the sixth time in his career. As the great season rolls on, let’s take a look through the entrants and pick out some who have the best chance at a win this week.
Jeff Gordon (+800) - Gordon remains without a win in his farewell season and that is sure not to be the case when 2015 comes to an end, and where better to do so than the track where he has three wins and 10 top-five finishes in his 18 career attempts. His average running position of 9.9 ranks him third amongst his peers and he has a solid 100.5 driver rating (5th best on circuit) behind 571 quality passes (2nd-most). He has finished in the top-10 at six of the past seven events and won the pole last week in Talladega, leading 47 laps in the race before finishing in 31st. Gordon will look to build on his victory in this same race last year and earn his first win of his final season under the lights of Kansas Speedway.
Kasey Kahne (+1500) - Kahne has a spotty 2015 resume, finishing in the top-10 at just four of his 10 events as he’s done worse than 30th in two of the past three weeks. He does have three poles at this track in the past and can certainly look to do that again here as he hopes to begin living up to the expectations placed on him when he joined the circuit. His average finish of 13.8 at this venue is solid and he does have four top-five finishes over 15 career visits. While most people will be down on this talented driver, others will look for the 35-year-old to get another solid start in Kansas.
Martin Truex Jr. (+2000) - Truex Jr. has yet to grab a win on this track over 13 career starts, but is tied with Kasey Kahne and Ryan Newman with three runner-up finishes in the past. He really has been all-or-nothing when here and has an average finish of 18.2 despite four top-fives. Truex Jr. has been one of the more consistent drivers on the circuit who has no victories this year as he has one runner-up finish and finished in the top-10 at all but one of his 10 starts. In his career, he has 104 top-10s with just two victories, but seems due for another trip to victory lane as his last one came in 2013.
Greg Biffle (+10000) - Biffle is a tremendous bargain at these odds as he has dominated this track in his 17 career starts. In that time he has an average finish of 10.9 with two wins and a total of seven finishes in the top-five. Biffle’s driver rating of 102.8 ranks him fourth amongst the racers when at Kansas Speedway and has spent 77.8% of his time here in the top-15 (3rd-most). Amazingly enough, Biffle has just one top-10 in 2015 (at Daytona), but has finished better than his pole position in four of the past five weeks and should be able to run near the top of the pack if he has a decent starting position.
Paul Menard (+10000) - Menard has had a solid 2015 season thus far; typically finishing in the 11-15 range, but does also have a fourth and a third with the latter coming last week at Talladega. He’s been running really hot in the last month, starting in the top-10 in three of the four races and with another solid pole could really do some damage at a track in which he has five career top-10s. His driver rating of 80.3 is solid and with 200/1 odds, the average finish of 15.6 is very promising. Menard is the hot hand right now and it would be no surprise to see him grab his third top-five of the year in Kansas.
- Carrie Stroup, Gambling911.com Senior Reporter
