NASCAR Shriners Children's 500 preview: Favorite, underdog, top storylines

On Sunday, the stars of the NASCAR Cup Series will traverse the one-mile Phoenix Raceway in the fourth race of the 2025 season. Ahead of Sunday's showdown, here's a favorite, an underdog and the storylines you should follow. 

Favorite: Christopher Bell (+500, per DraftKings)

Bell has won the last two Cup Series races at Atlanta and COTA and is the defending winner of the spring Phoenix race. He enters the week as the clear favorite to win his third race in a row, and if he continues at his current pace, he'll be contending for a championship when the circuit revisits Phoenix in November. 

Underdog: Ty Gibbs (+2800, per DraftKings)

Gibbs put together one of the most impressive performances of his young Cup Series career at Phoenix last spring. Gibbs led 57 laps en route to a third-place finish in the desert last year, and after a rough stretch to end 2024 and begin 2025, he could use another strong performance at Phoenix on Sunday. 

Bell looking to continue white-hot start 

Bell's hot streak to start 2025 can continue over the next several weeks. Trips to Phoenix, Las Vegas and Miami offer the 30-year-old driver the opportunity to make history. Should Bell win on Sunday, he'll be the first driver to win three consecutive races since the advent of the Next-Gen car in 2022. 

Will Penske dominance bloom?

Team Penske has risen to the occasion in the last three championship races at Phoenix, but that dominance hasn't translated to the spring races at Phoenix. Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney finished 1-2 at Phoenix in the 2024 championship race, and Roger Penske's trio of drivers likely present the biggest threat to Toyota on Sunday. 

Penalties have flip-flopped points standings 

Two drivers have seen their situation drastically change over the past two days when entering this weekend's race. Chase Briscoe's 100-point post-Daytona penalty was revoked by NASCAR, bumping him back up to 15th in the standings. On the other hand, Austin Cindric was penalized 50 points after hooking Ty Dillon at COTA, dropping him to 35th in the points going into Sunday's desert clash. Both drivers will have different approaches to Sunday's race and every other race this year until the regular season ends at Daytona.