NASCAR Cup Series

Dover Preview: The Series heads to Dover International Speedway for Sunday’s 400-lap race around the 24-degree banked ‘Monster Mile’. In 24 visits to the concrete oval, Hamlin has started from the pole position three times (tied for a career-best) and has qualified within the top-10 in his last eight consecutive starts. He finished eighth at Dover this time last year, even after sustaining major damage in a last-lap multi-car wreck.

Chase Elliott on if he looks forward to Dover because of his success at the track: “No, I hate doing that because when you think about one race too much you maybe put too much emphasis on it and you are getting your hopes up to potentially be let down. You just have to treat them all the same I think. Granted, it has been a good track for us and we’ve been fortunate to have some good runs at Dover over the past couple of years. Obviously, haven’t won a race there, but it’s been a solid track. Hopefully, it will continue to be solid for us and we can build off of what we had last year.”

Chevrolet leads all other manufacturers with 39 victories at Dover International Speedway. A win by a Team Chevy driver this weekend would add Dover to the elite list of tracks that Chevrolet has over 40 victories, a feat no other manufacturer competing in NASCAR’s top division can claim. Those tracks include: Atlanta Motor Speedway, Charlotte Motor Speedway, Darlington Raceway, Daytona International Speedway, Martinsville Speedway and Talladega Superspeedway.

AJ ALLMENDINGER, NO. 47 KROGER CLICKLIST CAMARO ZL1 - RACING AT DOVER INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY: "Racing at Dover (International Speedway) can be really similar to Bristol (Motor Speedway) at times," Allmendinger said. "Now, with Bristol using the VHT, it’s a little bit different. Over the last couple of years, and I think it depends on what kind of tire Goodyear brings, the groove has really started to widen out. There’s other times the track rubbers up and you can run the bottom."

Based on history the next seven races should be good news for Martin Truex Jr., who has suffered through a difficult stretch where issues not related to performance have plagued the reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion.

Of all the arguments made in favor of the XFINITY Series being a members-only division or at least diminishing the participation of Cup drivers, this stretch of Dash 4 Cash events (Bristol, Richmond, Talladega, Dover) has shown some of the best racing of the 2018 XFINITY season, all of which have been run by series regulars.

Ford’s fast start continued last weekend as Joey Logano won his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race of the season, giving the Blue Oval a series-best five victories in 2018.  This week’s stop is Dover International Speedway, where all three of NASCAR’s top touring series will be in action.  Here’s a look at how Ford has fared at the Monster Mile though the year

In six previous starts, Bayne has a career-best finish of 10th in the 2016 spring race. He finished 21st in last season’s spring event, and 24th last fall.

Stenhouse has 11 career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS) starts at Dover with an average starting position of 17.7 and average finishing position of 20.9.

KAHNE BY THE NUMBERS: In 28 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series career starts at Dover, Kasey Kahne has an average start of 14.2 and an average finish of 18.5. He’s completed 10,347 of 11,215 (92.3 percent) career laps, and has led for a total of 90 laps. Kahne has earned three top-five and eight top-10 finishes at the 1.0-mile track.