Muy bueno: Daniel Suarez pulls off upset win at Sonoma
Editor's note: Full race results, race notes and updated driver point standings follow this story.
When Daniel Suarez won the NASCAR Xfinity Series championship in 2016, including earning all three of his victories in that series, he was predicted for stardom in the NASCAR Cup Series.
Yet when he moved to NASCAR’s highest level in 2017, those stardom predictions slowly evaporated. First, he was with Joe Gibbs Racing, then Stewart-Haas Racing, then Gaunt Brothers Racing.
Unfortunately, he never lived up to those stardom predictions.
Finally, Justin Marks, rapper Pit Bull and TrackHouse Racing threw Suarez a lifeline at the beginning of the 2021 season. And even though the going has been rough, Marks and Pit Bull never lost faith in Suarez, his talent or his potential to win.
Sunday at Sonoma Raceway, Suarez paid back their faith in him, finally capturing his first-ever Cup victory, winning the Toyota / Save Mart 350.
“It’s crazy, I have so many thoughts in my heard right now,” Suarez told FS1 after a colossal victory burnout. “It’s been a rough go. It’s been a rough journey in the Cup Series.
“But these guys believed in me, TrackHouse Racing, Justin Marks, Ty Norris, they believed in me and never gave up on me.”
And then Suarez made a prediction: “This is the first one of many.”
Wins, that is.
But wait, there’s more.
Daniel Suarez promised that Sunday's win will be the first of many. Photo: Sean Gardner/Getty Images
By virtue of taking the checkered flag, Suarez has achieved something he never had before: in addition to his first-ever Cup victory, he also becomes eligible for his first NASCAR Cup playoffs.
That’s right, his win potentially puts Suarez in the 16-driver field that will ultimately wind up with someone winning the 2022 Cup championship.
And why not Suarez? There’s an old adage in racing that the first win is always the hardest. Now that he knows what it’s like to be a Cup winner, Suarez has the potential now of winning more races going forward in the remaining 20 Cup races this season.
That Suarez won on a road course – arguably one of the least predictable places for him to ever capture his first-ever Cup win – is hard enough to believe.
Prior to Sunday, Suarez had made 19 Cup starts on a road course. Seventeen of those resulted in finishes of outside the top 10. He only had two top-5 showings, both at Watkins Glen, third in 2017 and fourth in 2018.
That was it.
But Sunday, the 30-year-old Suarez was in the right place at the right time and now, all of a sudden, not only is he a Cup race winner, he’s also a road course winner. He’s also the 12th different winner of 2022 and the fourth first-time victor.
Sunday’s win also further enhanced TrackHouse Racing’s legitimacy this season. Suarez’s teammate, Ross Chastain, has two wins, seven top-5 and 10 top-10 finishes in the first 16 races. Chastain finished seventh in Sunday’s race. He and his team were among the first ones to congratulate their teammate for his awesome achievement.
While some may have felt Chastain’s first career win, at Circuit of the Americas, perhaps may have been a fluke, his second win at Talladega proved to be anything but a fluke.
And now, with Suarez’ win, two of TrackHouse Racing’s three Cup wins to date have come on road courses.
Daniel Suarez proudly displays the flag of his homeland, Mexico, after winning Sunday's Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)
What’s more, Suarez, a native of Monterrey, Mexico, becomes the fifth different winner in the Cup Series not born in the United States, joining Marcos Ambrose (Australia), Juan Pablo Montoya (Colombia), Earl Ross (Canada) and Mario Andretti (Italy).
Suarez got a bit of help in reaching victory lane, as several drivers made uncharacteristic mistakes, including three of the most preeminent road course drivers on the Cup circuit, namely Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott and Kyle Busch.
Instead of those three at the front of the pack, the top 10 finishers were Suarez, Chris Buescher (making his return after missing last week due to testing positive for Covid-19), 2021 Daytona 500 winner Michael McDowell, Kevin Harvick, 2022 Daytona 500 winner Austin Cindric, Ryan Blaney, Chastain, Elliott, William Byron and Brad Keselowski.
Even though he’s still in 20th position in the Cup standings following Sunday’s win, for the next two weeks (the Cup Series is off next weekend), Suarez will be able to revel in knowing that until the next race is held on June 26, he’ll still be No. 1 until then.
Or as Suarez might say in his native tongue, “Si!”
