Daniel Suárez reveals the key to his 2026 success with Spire

Daniel Suárez’s change of scenery from Trackhouse to Spire raised doubts, but the Mexican driver proved last weekend at the Coca-Cola 600 that he had made the right choice by securing his third career NASCAR Cup Series victory—a result that keeps him firmly in the hunt for a Chase spot.

Suárez now sits tenth in the championship standings, just six points behind teammate Carson Hocevar and over 60 points clear of the cut-line. The top 16 drivers in points will advance into the 2026 Chase for the championship.

Suárez doesn’t see himself as an underdog

Daniel Suarez, No. 7 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet

Although the move to Spire Motorsports was viewed by many analysts as a risky gamble, Suárez rejects the “victim” or “underdog” label that various sectors of the press have attempted to pin on his current sporting campaign.

“Well, I think it depends on who you ask, but to me, I’m not. But maybe to a lot of people I am, because I made a team change, last year we didn’t do things well, and the team I joined was struggling a lot—I mean, I think things didn’t look very good. However, I did know where we were heading, and that’s the part that is most, most important to me. So, I’m very happy with the way the team is working, how the team is progressing, and we have to keep pushing,” Suárez said in an interview with Motorsport.com.

“Obviously, we just won one of the most important races in NASCAR, and being able to do it this way on such a difficult and emotional weekend, I believe—I truly believe—it is one of the most important races of my life.”

When questioned about whether this conquest in Charlotte represents the most valuable triumph of his professional career—especially after becoming the first non-American driver to win Cup races on two ovals (adding to his historic victory in Atlanta)—Suárez maintains an ambitious mindset focused on the future:

“You know, I feel like the next one is always the most important. Mexico was the same; I think Mexico was the most important victory up to that moment, now this one is the most important, and hopefully Nashville will be the most important, and so on. But no, look, I feel very fortunate to have the luck and the team to fight for victories at this level. And well, as I mentioned, it has been, it’s been a long week, a weekend that was also difficult because it wasn’t just off the track, but on the track there was a lot—well, a lot of details. We had an issue with a wheel rim, and then we had an issue with a tire, and we had a car with good speed but we never managed to show it until the very end. So, I’m proud of the team and hopefully we can have more moments like this.”

“We’re just faster” — The reality behind Suárez Spire consistency

Daniel Suárez, Spire Motorsports

Unlike his previous years with Trackhouse Racing, where qualifying for the postseason depended almost exclusively on pulling off a miraculous win, the consistency shown by Daniel throughout the first 13 rounds of this year has kept him permanently in the playoff picture. For the Mexican, the key to this performance is no mystery, but rather the pure competitiveness of his race cars.

“I think the team is doing a good job, I think we are showing good speed. However, we still have work to do because even though we are strong within the top 10, 12, 13 positions, we know—and this is no secret—that our rivals, the competition, especially the Toyotas, are running hard, they are running very hard. So, we have work to do to catch them. If we want to have a real opportunity to fight for the championship, we have to beat them.”

Delving deeper into the technical and setup areas that the stable needs to polish in the short term to definitively establish themselves as a title contender, Suárez pointed to the details of balance between the days of track activity:

“It’s speed. I think we are doing a good job in our execution over the weekend and everything, but maybe we need to improve a bit from Saturday to Sunday. I think our Saturdays are strong, but the transition from Saturday to Sunday has to be a little better, and once we do that, if we can have a bit more overall speed, I think we are going to be right there.”

When questioned about the difference he has found this year compared to 2025, when some went as far as to think he wouldn’t have a Cup seat for 2026, he immediately replied:

“We’re simply faster, that’s the reality of things. It’s not magic; I’m not working harder this year than last year, nor did I forget how to drive last year. We simply have more speed, that’s the reality, and when you have more speed you get better results and it’s more consistent—you don’t have to be trying to hit home runs every single weekend. We’ve been more consistent and we already have a win just 13 races in. So, we have to keep working, we still have work to do and we have to keep improving ourselves because we are competing against everyone else, but also against ourselves. We have to keep improving our own version, and if we can do that, I think we are going to be in a very good position.”

The perfect puzzle: The best moment in Daniel Suárez’s career

Watch: Suárez wins Coca-Cola 600, salutes Kyle Busch

With the experience accumulated over several seasons in the Cup Series and notable intellectual maturity, the driver from Monterrey is clear that this year he possesses the necessary tools to silence the vindictive rumors of those who, during the last race in Mexico, predicted the decline of his career in the top category.

“They can jump on the bandwagon if they can, it’s fine, I have my arms wide open here. I think so [we are seeing the best Daniel], because I have experience, I’m still very young, I’m in great physical shape, and the team trusts me a lot.”

“Racing is like a puzzle—a jigsaw puzzle. If you don’t have all the pieces, you’re not going to be able to see the picture. It doesn’t matter how beautiful your puzzle is, if you don’t have all the puzzle pieces, it’s not going to look right. Racing is exactly the same, and sports are like that too. So, something I’ve learned is that if you don’t have all the pieces of the puzzle, it’s not going to work. Therefore, it’s very important as a driver and as a leader to understand that you have to find these pieces, and the team has to be willing to give them to you too. So, I think that with Spire Motorsports we have many of these pieces, yet we still have to keep working to find a few more.”

The pit call: The gamble that earned Suárez a crown jewel win

Daniel Suarez leads on a restart, No. 7 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet

The climax in Charlotte was marked by weather-related tension and surgical execution from the pit wall. After coming from behind and overcoming unscheduled pit stops due to issues that put him nearly two laps down, Suárez’s crew chief Ryan Sparks risked it all with a strategic stop that caught the rest of the competitors by surprise.

“Yes, it was hard, it was hard because we had problems multiple times with rims, tires, and so on, but the team did a great job. My engineers, Ryan, my boss, did a great job in making a good strategy and understanding what we had—what our strengths were, what our weaknesses were—and trying to take advantage of that. Obviously, we were also kept informed about what was happening with the weather, so that helped us too, and our gamble, combined with the speed of our car, a short run, and good restarts, gave us the victory.”

Finally, Suárez clarified that the risky decision to change only two tires instead of four was a brilliant read by his race strategist—a gamble based on track position and the imminent arrival of water at the oval.

“No, no, it was my crew chief; it was my crew chief who made the call to take two tires. I knew it was the right thing to do, because we were in 13th position, and I think there were only about 16 cars on the lead lap. If we took four tires, we were probably going to come out in 12th, 13th, or 14th. My car was fast, maybe with some good restarts we would have finished inside the top 10 and that’s it. If we took two tires, we were gambling a bit more to see how long we could hold on, and what’s the worst that could happen? That we drop back to where we already were, so I think it was a great decision.”

“We were gambling on that; we were betting on trying to be good enough to stay out front so that by the time the rain arrived—we knew it was going to arrive, but we didn’t know if we were going to be able to hold off the Toyotas on four tires for the next 10 to 15 minutes.”