Stat analysis: Can Hendrick retake Daytona from Gibbs?

When we last spoke about Hendrick Motorsports, the stat-based conclusion suggested that its 13 races were not up to HMS usual lofty standards – something that contributed to only Jimmie Johnson having a 2016 win under his belt.

But there was optimism heading into Pocono and, clearly, for good reason – Chase Elliott and Dale Earnhardt Jr. both challenged for victory, though ultimately lost out to the track's best driver Kurt Busch, while Kasey Kahne brought home a decent sixth.

While Elliott at this point will surely make the playoffs, Earnhardt's 39th place at Michigan and Tony Stewart's Sonoma win, the latter effectively erasing one of the Chase spots available on points, mean that Daytona – a good HMS track – is where both Dale Jr. and Kahne must deliver.

Daytona, however, will be almost certainly be a tougher test than Pocono, mostly because the 500 already suggests another team will excel – Joe Gibbs Racing.

The case for JGR

Joe Gibbs Racing and its ally team Furniture Row Racing finished a nifty 1-2-3-5 in the 500, with only Matt Kenseth a distant 14th, having entered the last lap in the lead.

And the team's strong run was clearly no fluke, as evidenced by the driver ratings – which place more importance on average running position than anything else.

2016 Daytona 500 driver ratings

That last characteristic might actually be problematic for a track like Daytona, where average position could be dependent on crash-avoidance tactics more than anything else, but the recent data allows to make a reasonable assumption that the fastest cars do indeed usually run up front.

While, in the other restrictor plate race of 2016 so far at Talladega, Penske's Brad Keselowski was undoubtedly best, Kenseth and Kyle Busch weren't far off, both leading plenty of laps and making up the top three in the driver ratings, despite Kenseth being collected in the usual Talladega happenings late on.

Even if the restrictor plate status quo has remained unchanged since that race, Keselowski is so very unlikely to be Gibbs' main headache this weekend, as he has more wins at Talladega than top 10 finishes at Daytona.

The case for Hendrick

Even despite how utterly wrong both of this season's plate races so far went for HMS, the fact Chase Elliott started both of them from pole merely hints the organisation should be Gibbs' main rival at Daytona, while recent history cements that as a pretty reasonable assumption.

After all, who is the best driver in terms of average ratings at the track in 2011-2015? Hi, Dale Earnhardt, Jr.

Who are drivers on that very same metric if, for everyone, you count out every abnormal race where the car went many laps down or didn't make the chequered flag? Hello there, Jimmie Johnson and Kasey Kahne (with Dale Jr. now in third place).

Add to that that all HMS cars in the 500 – aside from maybe Kahne, who ran a largely anonymous race but finished as the best of the quartet – seemed capable of winning, only for both Dale Jr. and Elliott to wreck and Johnson to be tagged with an uncontrolled tire penalty.

Current Hendrick, Gibbs and alliance drivers' Daytona ratings (2011-2015, ranked by best run)

Now, by the metrics we've used previously, Daytona is flagged up as a strongly below-average track for the likes of Johnson, Kyle Busch, and Kenseth, but that might not be entirely accurate because of Daytona's sheer tendency to skew towards grid average because of the incessant, often unavoidable crashing.

Instead, perhaps, a better metric is some sort of combination of the maximum rating (i.e. how good a run the driver got together at Daytona recently) and the ability of stay out of trouble (a rate of lead lap finishes per start).

And those suggest that Hamlin (who, if the 2016 result was counted, would top this table my some margin), Dale Jr., Johnson and Kenseth are the names to look out for this weekend.

The case for anyone else

The cop-out answer to “Who can disrupt the expected Hendrick v. Gibbs fight and come out on top?” is “anyone”.

Unfortunately, it's probably the most accurate answer for Daytona – look, for instance, at Trevor Bayne's shock win in 2011 and then look at the rest of Bayne's runs at the track (plus one top-10, plus one top-20 and basically nothing else).

That isn't something you can really call, nor could you have called the rain delay win for Aric Almirola, who hasn't finished higher than 12th in his other Daytona starts.

But, assuming a more or less normal race, there are some names that stick out.

A big factor – aside from Gibbs alliance driver Truex – is Penske's Joey Logano, the winner of the 2015 Daytona 500 and a driver who genuinely seems to get along with the track – last year's torturous Coke Zero 400 run aside.

The other obvious option? Kurt Busch, who's been good not just at Daytona, but in the Coke Zero 400 specifically over the recent few years .

New Chase additions?

Most of NASCAR's current frontrunners have now checked into Victory Lane and the opportunities for any of the smaller teams to follow them through are running out – with Daytona and Watkins Glen the two obvious opportunities for a surprise result in the remainder of the regular season.

But at HMS, three of its four drivers are still winless, and if Elliott, Kahne and Dale Jr. work together, they'll be hard to beat for anyone but Gibbs.

A Gibbs win, however, is far from the worst-case scenario for the Hendrick trio. The real problem would be an outsider victory, because that would deal a reasonably heavy blow to Dale Jr.'s and especially Kahne's chances of points-racing into the Chase, especially after Tony Stewart all but booked a spot last weekend.

Other notables' Daytona stats

Could, perhaps, Clint Bowyer and Greg Biffle, two drivers with stellar Daytona records, completely rewrite what have been terrible campaigns so far in one fell swoop?

Well, probably not – Biffle's record in the 400-mile race has been abject misery since his debut win in 2003, while Bowyer was completely nowhere in the 500 earlier this year.

Could one of the more consistent Daytona runners – the likes of Paul Menard, Regan Smith, Ricky Stenhouse or Austin Dillon – put themselves in just the right spot to steal a shock win? Maybe, but it'd take a fair bit of chaos for that.

Finally, is it a chance to shine for Danica Patrick, now that all three of her teammates are almost certainly in the Chase? That one's a “definitely maybe”. She has reasonably strong at superspeedways – far quicker than most people who usually run alongside her on other tracks – but has struggled to avoid wrecks.

This list could really go on for a long, long time, because almost anyone can win at Daytona. But the odds are that, on Sunday, most won't even come close.