At the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers lays the City of St. Louis.
Better known as “the Gateway to the West”, the city’s World Wide Technology Raceway stands as the site of the 15th round of the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series.
Last week’s Crown Jewel event at Charlotte Motor Speedway didn’t quite go to plan.
The Coca-Cola 600 released a screaming string of howling carbon-fiber beasts surging into the night after 6pm Eastern time with a notable exclusion: Kyle Larson.
The driver of the #5 HendrickCars Chevy missed the start of the race, opting instead to rail through Indianapolis Motor Speedway in the #17 Arrow McLaren Chevy for the Indianapolis 500.
With The Greatest Spectacle in Racing being delayed by four hours due to rain, the Cup Series star elected to stay in Midwest to compete and complete motorsports’ most prestigious events.
Justin Allgaier sat behind the wheel in Larson’s stead while teammate William Byron wrestled control of the race from Ty Gibbs that led to the Hendrick driver’s first stage win of 2024.
Christopher Bell rose from the third starting spot to take the lead for the first time on lap 121, but the biggest story of the second stage was defending 600 winner, Ryan Blaney, pounding the turn 4 wall on lap 159.
NASCAR’s 2023 Cup champion stumbled into the garage area, shaking up the pit strategy for the remaining lead-lap cars. The ensuing restart buried Bell in the pack, but he ultimately took the lead away from Byron to put the #20 in P1 on the scoring pylon for stage 2.
Bell, Byron, and new contender Brad Keselowski jostled for the top spot to open up stage 3. The tension ratcheted up when inclement weather floated into the area, all while Kyle Larson flew in the sky to hop back into his familiar #5 car for the final sprint to the finish.
Just as Larson entered the track’s airspace, the caution flew with Keselowski hot on Bell’s heels for the lead.
Larson was unable to complete the vaunted Double this season since he would’ve re-entered the race after the start of Sunday night’s 600-miler, but anticipation built among the fans due to the subsiding showers.
That anticipation was for naught. Just minutes after letting drivers know they need to return to their vehicles, NASCAR pulled a surprise move when they announced the delayed race official.
Bell claimed his second victory of 2024 and his first Crown Jewel victory after completing 249 of the scheduled 400-lap distance. SMI’s haste to withdraw their drying equipment provoked considerable consternation, especially from attending fans on social media
NASCAR published its cause for the shortened race, listing high humidity as a primary factor that inhibited them from fully and completely drying the racing surface. Even still, fans and media members pointed to close photos of the track’s asphalt that appeared suspiciously dry.
Per usual, the fan outrage failed to change the outcome, and now the series heads out to the Lou.
During intense preparations for the series’ third trip to northern Missouri, Stewart-Haas Racing announced that they’ll be shutting their doors at the conclusion of the 2024 season.
This means that SHR’s four charters will be auctioned off to new or expanding teams, and as part of the proposed charter agreement, teams will have a cap of three chartered entries with Joe Gibbs Racing and Hendrick Motorsports being grandfathered in with their current four-charter outfit.
Stewart’s decision sent shockwaves through the industry including the team’s four drivers — Chase Briscoe, Ryan Preece, Noah Gragson, and Josh Berry. Each driver kept chiseling away at a new contract by stringing together strong performance and keeping those familiar Fords up towards the front.
I’ll save the commentary for another time as this SHR situation is developing, so let’s head out to the track.
World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway stands as a 1.25-mile egg-shaped oval. Located in neighboring Madison, IL, Gateway broke ground on the oval track in 1995 before hosting its first oval race for the NASCAR Xfinity Series on July 26, 1997.
Initially renowned for its dynamic open-wheel racing and vintage Xfinity and Truck Series moments, the track fought off closure in the early-2010s before Curtis Francois, a real estate mogul and former Indy Lights driver, purchased the track from Dover Motorsports.
From there, Francois raised the track’s profile in a matter of years, bringing back the Craftsman Truck Series in 2014 before reuniting with the NTT IndyCar Series in 2017.
As stated earlier, Gateway held its long-awaited inaugural Cup Series race two years ago with Joey Logano taking the lead on the final restart to claim the second victory en route to his second championship.
Drivers roll out of turn 4 and onto the front straight where drivers streak across the finish line before arcing into the tight turn 1. Banked at 11°, the turn and the slightly-aged surface spread out the drivable groove to a lane below the wall, producing a cornucopia of lines to enter and exit the corner.
The entry to turn 1 and reaching the apex prove difficult for many as turn 1 is tighter than turn 2. Drivers buck their cars around the rumble strip on the bottom or ride close to the wall until arriving onto the angled backstretch that runs parallel with IL-203.
Gateway’s backstretch wall offers a neat quirk, opening up briefly to shield the brave track safety workers while also presenting an obstacle for careless drivers to avoid.
Slightly longer than the frontstretch, the 1,976-foot backstretch winds slowly to the right until entering the long, flat turns 3 & 4. These 9° corners encourage drivers to explore the available space to find grip, a line slightly faster to get a run to pass the next car ahead.
Cars wash out on the exit of turn 4, within arm’s reach of the outside wall before barreling to the finish line to complete the lap on the unique intermediate.
Now that we’ve taken a trip around the track, let’s head over to the weather and fast facts.
The Weather & Fast Facts
Though NASCAR has only held two Cup events at Gateway, I still crunched the weather numbers over the past 10 years for the first Sunday in June.
Sunday’s forecast shows a below-average day that will hover around 80°F at 3:30pm Eastern time when the starter’s stand unleashes a wild school of drivers on a 240-lap journey (split into three stages of 45-95-100 laps) around Gateway’s 1.25-mile facility, all airing on FS1.
Assuming this race goes to plan, the temperature looks to hang in that 80°F range for the duration of the race, which comes to about 3 hours and 18 minutes, so keep that in mind if you have evening plans.
There is less historical evidence to build upon compared to older, more established circuits on the NASCAR calendar, but that won’t stop me from analyzing the two previous races.
My calculations end with averages of 11 cautions for 60 laps, leading to 11 lead changes, and bringing about 1880 green-flag passes per race.
Gateway played host to an Overtime finish in its inaugural event where former teammates and current rivals Kyle Busch and Joey Logano lined up on the front row with Logano coming out on top. A sequel the following year saw Busch redeem himself by winning in his new #8 3Chi Cannabis Chevy Camaro.
Before heading into my writer’s pick, let’s make sure we take a look at the oddsmakers’ perspectives from the fine folks at DraftKings.
The Odds
Like last week, the rest of the regular season will feature the top-3 favorites from the Playoffs as well as two additional drivers that are not currently locked into the postseason.
First among them is Kyle Larson at == wait, I have misspoken.
Due to Kyle Larson’s absence at the Coca-Cola 600 (even though he fully intended to run that race until inclement weather interfered), Larson applied for a Playoff waiver this week, pending NASCAR approval.
NASCAR will likely grant Larson the exception, but some in the media believe that the decision is a lot more complex than it needs to be. The sport gave waivers to injured drivers like Kyle Busch in 2015 and Alex Bowman last season as well as to drivers parked for aggressive driving such as Chase Elliott in 2021.
If his application is denied, Larson will fall from third in points and be unable to compete for the points championship, meaning he wouldn’t be able to repeat his Championship Round appearance from 2023.
NASCAR will take their sweet time in coming to a decision, hoping the drama stirs interest and distracts from the controversial end to last week’s race while also highlighting one of the biggest disappointments in motorsports of this decade.
With that said, the first eligible driver we’ll be discussing is none other than Denny Hamlin (+380). The tenured JGR driver came close to stealing the win away from former stablemate Kyle Busch, a far cry from his frustrating 2022 trip.
23XI’s co-owner knows that he needs to build up his Playoff Point buffer by the time Darlington rolls back around in September, so look for DH to master the roads of Gateway onto his fourth win of the year.
Next up is William Byron (+1300). Rick Hendrick’s prize fighter bounced back from a disappointing month by earning two top-10s at Darlington (6th) and the rain-shortened Charlotte race (3rd).
The Daytona 500 champion has little history of elite performance at this tricky facility, but with a fast Hendrick Motorsports Chevy Camaro underneath him, Byron and crew chief Rudy Fugle prove time and again why they are a threat at each and every track.
Christopher Bell (+850) retains the last spot held by winners on the oddsmakers’ list. Bell’s troubles this season have been well-documented after his first win of the year in the heart of the desert.
A runner-up result in Austin preceded a hellacious month of April where the Oklahoma native landed outside the top-30 in three of four races before spending much of May in the tire tracks of true contenders.
His crew chief Adam Stevens used his experience in winning the Coke 600 with Kyle Busch in 2018 to his advantage, putting Bell third on the grid for the start of the race that culminated in the #20 team earning two stage wins on top of their first Crown Jewel together.
With eyes on trophies and more headlines, Bell strikes out on a trek through the southern tip of Illinois to tie himself with Byron and Hamlin in wins as the summer begins to heat up.
The last two drivers to look out for are former winners Joey Logano (+700) and Kyle Busch (+1300). Fresh off of a win in the All-Star Race at the similarly-flat North Wilkesboro, the two-time champ seeks a major rebound from the past two months, and Gateway could be the place for the #22 team to break through.
Having never finished outside the top-2 at St. Louis’ premier race track, the hardened multi-time champion wants to shake off the rust a little bit after pedestrian results at Darlington and Charlotte, and there isn’t a better place to do that than a track where you’re the reigning victor.
Writer’s Pick
My pick from the Coca-Cola 600 finished the rainy day in a pedestrian 15th place. That driver was Kyle “Rowdy” Busch, mounting frustrations for the rugged veteran piloting cars for Richard Childress.
This week, I’ll take my shot with a Ford Mustang Dark Horse and 2023 champ Ryan Blaney (+450) saddled inside the cockpit for Sunday’s 300-miler.
Issues and mistakes plummeted the defending winner of the Coke 600 down to a dismal 39th. Blaney’s poor run dropped him out of the top-10 in points though he remains plenty of points above the cutline that he doesn’t need to worry much just yet.
Roger Penske’s burgeoning star climbs the leader board early and often in the Prairie State, leading 95 laps while earning finishes no worse than 6th and 29 stage points.
Blaney’s Menards/Richmond Water Heaters Ford must regain control of his title defense. Driving at a flat track similar to Phoenix and New Hampshire might be just what the doctor ordered for the #12 team.
(Top Photo Credit: Jeff Roberson/AP Photo)
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