Mexico’s NASCAR phenom feels at home on Las Vegas track

By Jesse Granger

Sunday, March 5, 2017 | 2 a.m.

As the first Mexican driver in the history of NASCAR’s top series, Daniel Suarez is seldom comfortable.

Like every other driver, Suarez spends each Sunday of racing season in a cockpit that reaches 120 degrees while speeding around a track at nearly 200 mph with cars inches away on every side. Unlike the others, he’ll also be touring a country foreign to him while speaking a language he learned only five years ago.

The 25-year-old racing phenom finds little resemblance to his hometown of Monterrey, Mexico, anywhere in the NASCAR circuit, but he feels a little more at home when he comes to Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

“I always love coming to the West Coast,” Suarez said. “There are a lot of Hispanic and Latin American fans that come here. Plus, the Mexican food is way better than on the East Coast.”

Of the 38 races in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup schedule, only four are in cities west of Texas. The first comes at 12:30 p.m. March 12 with Las Vegas’ annual Kobalt 400.

“There are a lot of Hispanic and Latin American people here, and it’s amazing,” Suarez said. “I just love to be here, and I know that they love NASCAR here.”

NASCAR has for years tried to tap into the Hispanic fan base in the U.S., and Las Vegas Motor Speedway President Chris Powell said he believed Suarez would accelerate the process.

“Instead of just asking the Hispanic community to come out and see the good ol’ boys of NASCAR, now we’ve got a face we can build around, and it’s important,” Powell said. “When they come out and see Daniel Suarez race, they are going to be impressed. I would not be surprised to see him competing for the checkered flag this year.”

Suarez became the first Mexican to race in NASCAR’s top series when he started the engine of his No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota in the Daytona 500 on Feb. 26. He briefly threatened the top 10 in NASCAR’s annual opening race before a wreck derailed his afternoon. Suarez finished 141 of 150 laps to finish 29th.

It was still an early highlight of a career that’s reached the pinnacle of racing in unique fashion.

“My journey has definitely been different from most other guys,” Suarez said. “My family doesn’t come from racing, and my family doesn’t come from money. It’s been a good thing for me to go through difficult moments and learn from them.”

As a child, Suarez worked with his father in a shop in Mexico. He got his first taste of racing with go-karts when he was 11 and, by the age of 15, he had won a championship in the Kart Racing series.

In 2008, he joined NASCAR’s preliminary category in Mexico — Mini-Stocks — where he quickly became the youngest driver to win a race in the series. From there, he went to the NASCAR Corona Series in Mexico, where he was named rookie of the year in 2010.

He then left his family to chase his dream of competing against the best in the U.S.

“I didn’t speak English at all, and I didn’t have money to pay someone to teach me, so I taught myself,” Suarez said. “Those were tough moments, but I learned a lot.”

By 2015, Suarez was named the rookie of the year in NASCAR’s Xfinity Series, and a year later he became the first Mexican to win the Xfinity Series Cup Championship.

Meanwhile, in the top circuit, Joe Gibbs Racing was searching for a new driver following the retirement of Carl Edwards. It didn’t take long to zero in on Suarez to inherit Edwards’ fast car and experienced crew.

Suarez says interest in NASCAR has risen in Mexico recently, and he’s proud of paving the way for others from his country to get opportunities in the sport.

“When I moved to the United States, there were no Mexican drivers behind me trying to make this dream, but now you see lists and lists of Latin American drivers trying to get into NASCAR,” Suarez said. “That’s amazing to me, because it means we are opening a path for all of those guys and kids with talent.”