Busch holds off Bodine for Chicagoland truck win

Autoracing Betting Lines

08/28/2010 - Joliet, IL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Kyle Busch won his fourth consecutive NASCAR national touring series race by taking Friday night's EnjoyIllinois.com 225 at Chicagoland Speedway.

Busch, who won the Sprint Cup, Nationwide and Truck Series races at Bristol last week, put on a dominating performance, but had to hold off a furious charge from pole sitter Todd Bodine in the closing laps to claim his fourth victory of the season and the 20th of his truck career.

"Todd ran me down and probably was going to pass me there, but I got a run on the outside, and I think he slipped a little bit," said Busch, who also won this race at Chicagoland last year.

Busch led a total of 121 laps, but had to charge from sixth to first after a late-race round of pit stops under caution. He passed Bodine with 24 laps remaining. Bodine chased him down shortly after and made several attempts to reclaim the lead.

The fifth caution for Timothy Peters' blown engine set up a green-white- checkered finish. Busch easily pulled away from Bodine after the final restart and then beat him at the finish by 0.19 seconds.

"Second stinks," Bodine jokingly said. "Right there at the end with Kyle, I had him on the outside, and he pinched me up into the wall, and then I had him on the inside, and I got loose going into [turn] three. It was good racing with him."

Busch is now tied with Bodine for fourth on the series' all-time race winners list.

Ron Hornaday Jr. finished third, followed by Johnny Sauter and Justin Lofton.

Aric Almirola, Matt Crafton, Rick Crawford, Austin Dillon and David Starr completed the top-10.

Bodine increased his lead to 236 points over Almirola with eight races remaining in the season.

Busch will attempt to win his fifth straight national touring race next Friday when the Truck Series competes at Kentucky Speedway.

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Betting the NFL preseason

Rule No. 1 in the gamblers' handbook states, "Avoid sports betting on meaningless games."

When you're drowning in a sea of baseball monotony, however, things change. Even a hint of pro football betting can persuade the most disciplined bettor to break a few rules. 

The NFL preseason is around the corner, with a tempting Hall of Fame match kicking off on Sunday. But bettors must stay vigilant. Wagering on NFL exhibition games is an entirely different beast than the regular season. Most fans don't recognize the players on the field because starters get as much action in August as Warcraft fans get on Prom night.

The only certainty about the NFL this time of year is uncertainty – and yet there are some who say betting in August can be a gold mine.

“I actually feel the NFL preseason presents solid profit opportunities for sharp bettors and handicappers,” Sports Expert Steve Merril explains. “My experience has been that the sportsbooks fear the preseason, which is evident by lower limits and massive moves.”

The line moves are attributed to the limited knowledge available regarding playing-time distribution. One team’s top unit out on the field for one more series has an impact on the pointspread. Setting lines in the preseason often is a shot in the dark.

“We base the betting lines mostly on public perception,” Pete Korner, founder of the Sports Club in Las Vegas, says. “It’s very tough to predict, almost a guessing game.”

The preseason is all about figuring out who’s in and for how long.

“It becomes a race between bettors and oddsmakers to find out how long the quarterbacks are going to stay in,” Korner admits. “If a sharp gets the information first, he could exploit an early line. I’m a full believer in moving the line in the preseason if the books find out something late in the week.”

Determining what each team’s motive is can help bettors handicap. To do this you must pay close attention to the philosophies head coaches employ in exhibition play.

“You need to know what a coach is trying to accomplish,” says Covers Expert Bryan Leonard. “Sometimes a new coach will want to instill a winning attitude. Others just want to make sure their starters don’t get hurt."

So how do you distinguish who’s playing scared and who’s playing for keeps?

“Head coaches on the hot seat or new coaches trying to implement a winning attitude usually try harder to win in the preseason,” Merril says.

Cleveland Browns head coach Romeo Crennel fits this criteria. He’s entering his third season as the sideline boss and has yet to lead the Browns to more than six wins.

Cleveland is an enticing bet as well because of the unresolved quarterback situation. General manager Phil Savage sacrificed the Browns’ first-round pick in next year’s draft for Brady Quinn, but the former Notre Dame quarterback hasn’t signed or reported to training camp yet.

Charlie Frye and Derek Anderson split time at QB last season and it looks like either player (or even Quinn) could be the opening-day starter.

“If a team has quarterback depth and the pecking order hasn’t been decided, it’s a big advantage,” Leonard says.

Even in the third week of the preseason when starters generally play the most, the final outcome of the game is in the hands of fringe players. A team's talent, all the way down to the last man on the roster, is something to consider.

The New England Patriots have long been considered one of the deeper teams in the NFL and coach Bill Belichick has said in the past he’s unafraid of stars getting hurt in games with nothing on the line. He shocked his colleagues in 2003 by playing some of his starters on special teams in the preseason.

“We want to have the team ready to play a tough, physical game and preparation has to go into that and I imagine a certain amount of injuries go with it,” Belichick told the Providence Journal in August 2003.

Bettors can only hope to find more teams that share the Pats' business-like approach to the preseason (New England is 17-9-3 against the spread since 2000) and take advantage of teams who detest the exhibition schedule.

To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your bet on football needs. Mysportsbook.com online sportsbook accepts Visa and Mastercard credit cards.