In all his high hopes and hard work over the last year to promote Nascar’s return to his home country of Mexico, even Daniel Suárez could not have imagined the amazing story of his dramatic win in Saturday’s The Chilango 150 – coming from last place on the grid in a backup car and charging to Victory Lane.
After victory spinouts, the 33-year old from Monterrey, Mexico, climbed out of his No 9 JR Motorsports Chevrolet, stood on the car’s roof, pounded his chest and pointed upward to the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez grandstands – shouting to the thrilled crowd in his native Spanish and thanking his loyal fans for their support.
“It’s everything I was looking for, just a special day,” said an emotional Suárez, the 2016 Nascar Xfinity Series champion, who led a race-best 19 of the race’s 65 laps and beat Taylor Gray to the checkered flag by .598 seconds in a backup car the team rebuilt after he crashed in the morning qualifying session.
“It’s a very special day to be here in front of my people, all these people that have supported me for many, many years and known me since my Nascar Mexico days. Now I’m fighting with the big boys,” said Suárez, who was forced to use the “international provisional” starting position after his incident in qualifying.
Even after diligently working his way through the 37-car field, Suárez had to earn this win by every definition. The Nascar Cup Series full-timer went door to door with Gray on a restart with three laps remaining, ultimately pulling away – only to have to fend off a fast-approaching Gray again on the final stretch of the last lap.
Suárez first took the lead Saturday in similarly dramatic fashion, prevailing on a three-wide restart with 19 laps remaining.
He emerged out front after going head-to-head with the race’s early leaders, rookie Connor Zilisch and fellow Nascar Cup Series regular Ty Gibbs. The polesitter Zilisch, who led 17 laps, wheel-hopped taking the opening corner of a crowded restart, spun and then hit his JR Motorsports teammate Carson Kvapil as the pileup behind began.
Gibbs, who led 18 laps, moved forward from the initial contact then made contact with Kvapil’s Chevy on the next turn. The ensuing pileup affected 13 cars to varying degrees.
Suárez drove through the melee, drawing a massive cheer from the crowd. The Mexican fans stood on their feet, arms raised, Mexican flags in the air.
Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Hill finished third, Kaulig Racing’s Christian Eckes was fourth and Zilisch recovered to finish fifth in another of the day’s more remarkable efforts.
After that incident with 17 laps remaining, Zilisch fell back to 28th place with damage to the right side of his Chevy, only to move through the field at a remarkable pace – up 14 positions in the three laps after the restart. He was in 10th place with 10 laps to go, finishing among the top five.
“I’m proud of my team for their effort,” said Zilisch, who leaned against his car alone on pit road, obviously disappointed with the outcome after such a strong afternoon.
“Obviously the finish isn’t what we wanted. We probably had a better car than fifth place, but we got caught up in an incident on that last restart. Just proud to be able to come here and get a decent finish.
William Sawalich, Austin Green, Jeb Burton and his cousin, Harrison Burton, and Sammy Smith rounded out the top 10.
There were seven lead changes among six drivers, with Kvapil winning the first stage and Smith winning stage two.
Nascar Xfinity Series championship leader Justin Allgaier had to take his No 7 JR Motorsports Chevrolet behind the wall for repairs before the end of the first stage, ultimately settling for a 34th-place finish, 15 laps down to the winner. Fortunately for the reigning series champion, he held a 92-point advantage over Hill atop the points standings heading into Mexico City. He now leads by 54 points.