By Aaron Bearden, Motorsports Editor

Ahead of each NASCAR race weekend, Kickin’ the Tires previews the upcoming races, looking at the storylines entering the events while highlighting when and where to watch them. 

Weekend Schedule

Thursday, March 1

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series practice: 5:05-5:55 p.m. (No TV)

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series practice: 7:05-7:55 p.m. (No TV)

Friday, March 2

Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series practice: 2:00 a.m.-2:55 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

NASCAR XFINITY Series practice: 3:05-3:55 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

NASCAR XFINITY Series final practice: 5:05-5:50 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series qualifying: 6:05 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series qualifying: 7:15 p.m (FOX Sports 1)

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Stratosphere 200: 9:00 p.m. (FOX Sports 1) 

Saturday, March 3

Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series practice: 12-12:55 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

NASCAR XFINITY Series qualifying: 1:10 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series final practice: 2:30-3:20 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

NASCAR XFINITY Series Boyd Gaming 300: 4:00 p.m. (FOX Sports 1)

Sunday, Feb. 25

Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Pennzoil 400: 3:30 p.m. (FOX)

(All times ET)

Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series

Race Name: Pennzoil 400

Track: Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Las Vegas, Nev.)

Race Length: 267 laps, 400.5 miles

Race Stages (Laps): 80, 80, 107

Track Length: 1.5 miles

Track Record: 196.328 mph (Kurt Busch, 2016)

What Happened Last Year: Martin Truex Jr. benefitted from mechanical woes from leader Brad Keselowski in the final laps, surging to a victory that would serve as the catalyst for his dominant 2017 Cup Series title run.

What to Watch For

The Blue Oval Brigade

The first intermediate race of the season at Atlanta Motor Speedway was a Ford-dominated affair, with Blue Ovals claiming the top three positions and half of the top 10 at the end of the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500.

The result was surprising to many. Kevin Harvick’s dominance wasn’t unprecedented – he’s led 116 or more laps in each of the last five races at Atlanta, after all – but the emergence of his Stewart-Haas Racing teammates and strength of Team Penske went against the trends seen in the late stages of last season.

Harvick cruised to an emotional victory at the site of his first Cup win in 2001. Defending winner Brad Keselowski posed Harvick’s fiercest challenge, leading 38 laps and running within sight of the leader throughout the night. Kurt Busch battled for the lead in the mid-race stages, Clint Bowyer spent the majority of the day in the top five and both Joey Logano and Aric Almirola battled for position in the top 10 for much of the race’s 500 miles.

Ford was arguably the strongest team in Atlanta, outperforming Toyota’s Martin Truex Jr. and Kyle Busch on one of the intermediate ovals they dominated for much of last season. Now, can they repeat the performance this weekend in Las Vegas?

That remains to be seen. But if they can deliver on the smooth Las Vegas oval, then Ford should be considered an early championship threat.

Looking for Trends

Ford won’t be the only ones watching to see if their Atlanta results are indicative of their group’s overall performance. The entire field will be looking to see how they fair relative to their competition.

The season-opening Daytona 500 is a thrilling, prestigious race. But it often has little correlation with performance through the rest of the season. That means Atlanta offered the first real test of teams on the schedule’s standard fair.

If Atlanta offered the first true test, then Las Vegas will provide the first chance to see multi-race trends.

Stewart-Haas Racing and Team Penske will look to continue the strong execution they managed in Atlanta. Toyota’s top two teams – Joe Gibbs Racing and Furniture Row Racing – will attempt to bounce back from quiet intermediate track debuts with one of the dominant performances they turned in last season.

Chevrolet will attempt to reverse course, aiming for a rebound after a dreadful Atlanta weekend that saw their highest finisher (Kyle Larson) in ninth. Most notable among the Bowtie brigade searching for speed is Hendrick Motorsports, who had just one top 10 among eight starts in the opening two events.

Two similar races isn’t enough to establish concrete trends or data, but it will offer the first step in that direction. Watch the front of the field and see if it’s filled with familiar faces.

Talking About Aero

Few words among the NASCAR lexicon have been met with quite the same disdain as the term aerodynamics.

In recent years drivers have been heard early and often chiming into their teams with reports of a car that is “aero-loose” or “aero-tight” around their competitors, meaning the cars suffer from noticeably worse handling conditions as they close up on other machines, making passing difficult and giving the leader a significant advantage with clean, undisturbed air.

The effects of aero in the traditional sense have been less pronounced in the opening two races of the 2018 season. Daytona International Speedway is all about air, but in a different manner. The restrictor plates group the field together in packs, forcing them to utilize the air to pass each other with drafting.

Atlanta provides similar aerodynamic characteristics to Las Vegas. But the track’s old, abrasive surface places greater emphasis on tire wear, allowing teams to complete overtakes later in runs as their opponents burn through their Goodyear tires.

Las Vegas has a smoother surface, so it should be anticipated to operate more like the standard intermediate NASCAR track, where drivers can run “qualifying laps every lap,” as Clint Bowyer claimed in his post-race media availability at Atlanta. Given that, don’t be surprised if the dreaded ‘A’ word makes an appearance.

Pennzoil 400 Entry List

NASCAR XFINITY Series

Race Name: Boyd Gaming 300

Track: Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Las Vegas, Nev.)

Race Length: 200 laps, 300 miles

Race Stages (Laps): 45, 45, 110

Track Length: 1.5 miles

Track Record: 185.580 mph (Elliott Sadler, 2017)

What Happened Last Year: Joey Logano led early and often, pacing the field for 106 laps en-route to the victory in a Cup-dominated affair. Logano, Kyle Larson, Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski combined to lead 199 of the race’s 200 laps, with only JJ Yeley carrying the torch for XFINITY Series regulars on a single circuit.

What to Watch For

Cup Series Domination

Yes this is the same lead topic as last week. That was done on purpose.

The Cup stars destroyed their Xfinity competition in last year’s Las Vegas race, leading 199 of the event’s 200 laps and claiming four of the top five spots at race’s end. Joey Logano was the dominant force in the event, leading 106 laps as he claimed a victory for Team Penske. Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson add 48 and 33 laps, respectively, and Brad Keselowski threw in an additional 12.

Cup drivers have claimed the last four Xfinity events in Las Vegas, with Keselowski, Busch, Austin Dillon and Logano each taking a race. The last time an Xfinity regular claimed the event was in 2013, when Sam Hornish Jr. beat out a host of Cup drivers to bring home the win.

Saturday’s entry list includes Dillon, Busch, Larson and Ryan Blaney, all driving for the Xfinity affiliates of their respective Cup teams. The odds are strong that it’ll be one of the Cup quartet hoisting up a trophy at race’s end.

The Kyle Busch Show Heads Home

The Boyd Gaming 300 will mark the first Xfinity Series start of 2018 for Busch, bringing back the tour’s winningest driver as he searches for victory No. 92.

Anytime Busch is in the field in one of NASCAR’s lower tours he immediately becomes one of the favorites to deliver a race win, and Saturday should be no exception. The 2015 Cup champion has just one win in 13-career Xfinity starts on the 1.5-mile oval, but he’s led 521 laps and finished no worse than seventh in his last four starts at the track.

Busch will also be racing with added motivation this weekend. Las Vegas is the Nevadan’s home track, and he’ll be attempting to become the first driver to sweep the weekend in the track’s 23-year history.

Boyd Gaming 300 Entry List

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series

Race Name: Stratosphere 200

Track: Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Las Vegas, Nev.)

Race Length: 134 laps, 201 miles

Race Stages (Laps): 40, 40, 54

Track Length: 1.5 miles

Track Record: 178.065 mph (Mike Skinner, 2006)

What Happened Last Year: The Truck Series lay dormant, one year removed from their first season with two trips to Las Vegas. The series wouldn’t run at Vegas until Sept. 30 – a race won by Ben Rhodes.

What to Watch For

Third Time’s the Charm

Two races into the Truck Series season, the tour has seen two series regulars in victory lane. Johnny Sauter was the first, keeping his competitors at bay to claim the opening event of the year at Daytona. Brett Moffitt followed last weekend, earning his second-career win to add his name to the playoff field.

With two series regulars on the board and only eight drivers eligible to make the postseason, the preliminary Truck Series playoff grid is already a quarter of the way to completion.

The prospects for drivers hoping to point their way into a postseason appearance have already begun to dwindle, and there are still 14 races remaining in the regular season. That leaves 14 opportunities for other series regulars to find their way to victory lane, many of which will likely be taken advantage of.

There’s still a strong chance that the tour will see fewer than eight winners during the regular season. But for teams with championship ambitions that have yet to win, the early trends indicate that they may need to make a trip to victory lane before the playoffs if they want to post with the championship trophy at the postseason’s end.

The Kyle Busch Show… Part II

Last week offered a rare reprieve for the Truck Series field, when what appeared to be another eventual win for Busch fell apart with a late mistake on pit road. The victory instead went to Moffitt and Hattori Racing, supplying a feel-good moment for owner Shigeaki Hattori as the team scored their first win and penciled their name onto the preliminary playoff grid one year after missing the playoffs on a tiebreaker.

But there’s bad news, Truck Series field – Busch is back for revenge this weekend.

‘Rowdy’ will pilot the No. 51 Toyota for his own Kyle Busch Motorsports team this Friday, looking to claim his first Truck win at the facility to start off what would be Las Vegas’ first tripleheader weekend sweep.

Accomplishing the feat should prove to be a challenge, but it wouldn’t be unprecedented for Busch. He’s already accomplished a similar weekend sweep twice at Bristol Motor Speedway, with the second feat coming just last August.

Getting in Spec, Part III

The first race of the season at Daytona International Speedway was won by a spec motor.

The second was powered by an OEM.

The war between the new Ilmor spec engines and the traditional OEM motors wages on in the Truck Series this weekend at Las Vegas, and the success – or lack thereof – of the spec motors will continue to be a storyline and point of emphasis for the entire Truck field.

Spec motors looked competitive in Atlanta, even if they didn’t ultimately bring home the win. The majority of teams either have or are pushing to obtain Ilmor engines, with the motor perceived to have better performance thus far.

That thought was put to the test with Moffitt’s win in Atlanta, but a victory at Las Vegas would quickly quell any worries fostered by the early Toyota OEM motor’s triumph.

Stratosphere 200 Entry List