Daniel Suarez Finds Success in Vegas Runner-Up After Two Rough Weeks
While the overall raw speed has been present for Daniel Suarez and the No. 99 Chevrolet throughout the opening five weeks of the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series campaign, the finishes just hadn’t synced up for the Trackhouse Racing driver, yet.
In the series’ last two events, at Circuit of The Americas and Phoenix Raceway, Suarez found himself in legitimate contention for top 10 results, until an on-track issue in the second-half of the event foiled those stellar point-building runs.
At COTA, Suarez made a small mistake in Turn 19 which caused his Chevrolet to spin around, but before the two-time NASCAR Cup Series winner could get going again, his rookie teammate Connor Zilisch clobbered him, and ended both of their afternoons.
Similarly, the following week at Phoenix, Suarez was on-track to record a sixth-place result at the one-mile oval in Arizona, when the lapped car of Katherine Legge spun directly in front of him, heavily damaging the No. 99 and relegating him to a finish outside the top 20.
So, while there’s bound to be a smidge of disappointment for the Monterrey, Mexico-native following a near-miss in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series event at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Suarez is also ecstatic to have a fantastic finish under this belt this season.
“Definitely a little disappointed,” Suarez told FOX Sports post-race.
“The No. 99 Freeway Insurance Chevrolet team did everything right. The pit crew did an amazing job with the pit stops. We did everything right with the strategy. Our Chevrolet was fast, but we just struggled a little bit on the short runs. I mentioned to my crew chief – before the last run, I told him that if we’re going to be up front we’re going to need a better car for the short run. I was having too much contact over there in [turns] one and two.”
After spending more than half the event running inside the top-10, Suarez elected to stay on the racetrack at Lap 195, while many of the race-leaders, including teammate Ross Chastain, chose to come down pit road and strap on a brand-new set of tires.
When another caution, this one for Noah Gragson, was displayed at Lap 242, Suarez was saved from a potential green-flag pit stop, giving the No. 99 team, with crew chief Matt Swiderski, track position to capitalize on the entire field returning to the pits for fresh tires.
On the race’s final restart, with 20 laps remaining, Suarez inherited the race-lead from Josh Berry and Joey Logano, who had a horrendous final pit stop which not only lost him the lead but lost him at least 15 positions in the blink of an eye.
As it turned out, the three major winners on that same strategy – Daniel Suarez, Josh Berry, and Ryan Preece – would be fighting it out for the victory, with Berry and Wood Brothers Racing attacking the 33-year-old driver in the final laps, ultimately making the pass for the victory with 16 laps remaining, and driving away to a convincing victory.
“Overall, just very, very proud of everyone at Trackhouse Racing,” Suarez added. “The entire organization has been working very hard and it’s showing.”
The strong result for the No. 99 launches Suarez from 29th to 21st in NASCAR Cup Series point standings, bringing him one step closer to fighting for a spot in the NASCAR Playoffs, after a rough couple of weeks has dropkicked him down the standings.
Suarez will now head to Homestead-Miami Speedway, the track in which he was crowned NASCAR Xfinity Series champion, looking for his first set of back-to-back top-five results since his second season of NASCAR Cup Series competition in 2018.
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Joseph Srigley covers NASCAR for TobyChristie.com, Racing America, and OnSI, and is the owner of the #SrigleyStats brand. With a higher education in the subjects of business, mathematics, and data analytics, Joseph is able to fully understand the inner workings of the sport through multiple points of perspective.