TRACK: Texas Motor Speedway (1.5-mile Oval) DISTANCE: 200 Laps (300 Miles)
WEATHER: RAIN 8%, 97 degrees at race time

Spotter Guide

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Betting favorites

Josef Newgarden (+450)

Heading into last June, Newgarden had no top fives and just one top 10 in seven Texas starts. Then, he went out and won. Now that he’s over the hump, watch out.

Alexander Rossi (+500)

Trends say he will win he was third in 2018 and runner up in 2019.

Scott Dixon (+600)

Dixon has won this race in two of the last five years (2015, 2018) to go along with a 2008 victory as well. He has four runner-ups (2003, 2006, 2011, 2011 -Duels) and three top five finishes in his last six Texas starts overall. Dixon, also has four top 10s in his last six starts there as well.

Will Power (+700)

He’s one of the top superspeedway racers in the series. He won this race in 2017 and has eight top 10s in his last 10 Texas starts. Also, Power has four superspeedway wins in his last eight tries including six top fives in as many racs. 

Simon Pagenaud (+800)

The defending Indy 500 champion has four straight top six finishes at Texas including three of those being in the top four. He also has eight straight top eight finishes on superspeedways including three podiums in his last four tries. 

Sleepers

Colton Herta (+1100)

He had a quick car last year before crashing with Dixon. He won the last race of 2019, why not the first of 2020?

Ryan Hunter-Reay (+1600)

This is a solid sleeper pick. RHR has two straight fifth place finishes at Texas.

James Hinchcliffe (+1600)

With two top fours in the last four Texas starts and some extra motivation, this could be his race to win.

Graham Rahal (+1600)

A past Texas winner with four straight top sixes there. A good value here.

Takuma Sato (+2200)

He won the Indy 500 in 2017. Was third last year. He also has two top 10s in his last three Texas starts and would have three straight if not for a pit road mistake in this race in 2019.

Tony Kanaan (+5000)

This is one of TKs best tracks. He has a win and five runner-ups there including three podiums in his last five Texas starts.

Genesys 300 Preview

Hot temps, high speeds, close racing, prime time and network TV. Throw in the fact that we’re still in the midst of a global pandemic and you have more eyeballs are your disposal on Saturday night and you get a heck of a time for the NTT IndyCar Series to make their 2020 season debut. 

For the first time in nearly nine months, INDYCAR is back. The last race that they ran was back in September for the 2019 season finale at Laguna Seca. Other than a few tests, nothing has been run in terms of seat time since. Now, here we go in a one-day modified show with a race moved from 600 kilometers as originally scheduled, to 300 miles — a difference of 48 laps. Strategy is going to be the name of the game on Saturday night with Firestone wanting teams to have to pit for new tires every 35 laps. Without any on track activity on a superspeedway prior to Saturday, the loading on the tires could be a concern. They feel if the life of the tire on each car don’t exceed 35 laps, then they’d be fine, which means pit calls are going to be fun to watch. That in turn has drivers worried about a potential for a pack race again. With the shelf life of these tires being vastly shorter now, the pit windows are smaller and the fall off could be minimal. 

With a new Aeroscreen, limited practice, the heat of the day and being out of the cars for over a half of a year, Texas is going to be treacherous on Saturday night. 

We’ve also had few cautions too with 11 of the last 12 races having five or fewer, meaning the race has been a clean show, which in turn leads to pit strategy on these cycles. Fresh tires vs. old tires used to be SECONDS of a difference. When do you pit for new tires and when do you stay out for the 35 lap max? Do the tires even fall off much to make a difference?

Also, we start the year off on a superspeedway. Racing on these high speed tracks is an art. Not everyone can do it. It’s an acquired skill that times time to perfect. Most of the top guys in this discipline of racing weren’t on top of their games when they started on them. These used to be Will Power’s Achilles Heel. Now, these are arguably his best tracks with half of his last eight superspeedway starts resulting in victory. Power, has five top eight finishes in his last eight tries too. Simon Pagenaud is the same. Five of his last eight superspeedway starts have resulted in a top four finish. He’s not finished outside the top eight in that time frame. Even their teammate Josef Newgarden has gotten a better handle on them. Seven of his last 12 on them were in the top five including five of his last seven inside of the top five actually. Scott Dixon has four podiums in his last six superspeedway tries while Alexander Rossi has six top four finishes in his last seven tries on them. They’re the ones to beat for a reason. 

So, does Honda’s advantage at Texas stay too? While Newgarden won last year in a Chevrolet powered car, Honda drivers accounted for leading 194 of the 248 completed laps and took four of the top five finishing positions including six of the top eight even. Newgarden, was the only Chevy driver to lead and he did so all at the end. In 2018, Honda led 66-percent of the laps (162 of 248) and took eight of the top nine finishing positions then as well. That’s Honda leading 72-percent of the Texas laps over the last two years. That’s why without any sample size of a race to go by this season, you should side with a Honda driver on Saturday night. 

But there’s also the Penske mark where they’ve won two of the last three races at Texas, won all three superspeedway races a year ago and six of the last eight on superspeedways’s dating back to 2017. 

Penske, Ganassi and Rahal have also combined to win the last five years and should be the ones to beat again under the lights this weekend. 

Stat To Watch

Out of the last eight Texas races, none have been won by a front row starter. In fact, we’ve only had one winner since 2012 coming from the top five even (Ed Carpenter 2014). Six of the last seven though have been won from Row 3 (twice) Row 4 (3 times) or Row 5 (once). Part of this reason is, it’s tricky to land the right amount of downforce. 

Team Penske has struggled in the past with finding the right amount of balance to race at Texas with. They typically qualify well there but they haven’t figured out how much or how little downforce to start with. See, with clean air up front, you want to go lighter on the downforce. By doing so, you have quicker lap times which makes you hard to catch and pass. The problem is, what happens if you have a mishap on pit road or even on track and fall outside of the top five?

Light downforce means a bad handling car in traffic. That’s why for eight straight years that the winner of this race has come from a starting spot outside of the top five including the last four being 13th, 9th and a pair of 7ths respectively.

The reason?

They go heavier on the downforce and can adjust as the race goes on.

They Said It

“I think it should be pretty good,” Scott Dixon said of the Aeroscreen’s debut at Texas. “I think with some of the testing that we had done even at Indianapolis, Richmond, then a bunch in the road course kind of platform, I think the unknowns we’ve never really run at night with the Aeroscreen. They moved the race starting time up by an hour so you’re going to have that transition from the light. It could be a bit of an issue.

“Honestly, some of those things we kind of witnessed a little bit of that at COTA when the practice session ended quite late. There were some pieces that you could kind of put on the screen to help with some of the reflection. That was better.

“As far as tire deg, I don’t know. We’re going in with a little bit of an unknown. There’s a few teams that have run the tire spec we will run. We have not. Shortening the stint by half I think kind of eliminates the whole tire deg thing. I wish there was more of a range they’d come up with as opposed to chopping it right in the middle.

“I don’t know. I think the short answer is I think we’re going to be perfectly fine. There’s always the opportunity of an unknown that trips a couple of people up. I think it’s going to be perfectly fine.”