MEXICO CITY — It was evident when Daniel Suárez stepped off the bus before Friday’s practice and was greeted by a swarm of Mexican media, a mariachi band and a group of luchador wrestlers that the hero had returned home.
For Suárez, whose dreams of becoming a professional race car driver started some 567 miles north of Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Monterrey, it’s not just a homecoming weekend for the No. 99 Trackhouse Racing driver but almost a gigantic family reunion as he carries the pride of a whole country in Sunday’s Viva Mexico 250 (3 p.m. ET, Prime Video, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
“The entire week and up to now. It has exceeded every single expectation that I have had. … It has been a dream,” Suárez said.
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The moment has not been lost on him — even with the weight of expectation, a hectic media schedule and logistical setbacks for his crew, Suárez is choosing joy amid all the hullabaloo.
“I’m just enjoying. I’m like a kid on Christmas. That’s why you guys see me with a smile,” he said.
His smile hasn’t faded even in the face of real challenges. A flight delay kept many of his team members from arriving in time for opening practice, forcing the group to scramble just to get on track.
“I love the pressure. You put me against the wall, and I’m going to come back at you swinging,” Suárez said. “So I’m good with it. You know, this is just gonna be a better story. You know, we win on Sunday, and then we’re gonna be laughing about, ‘hey, we almost didn’t make practice.’ You know, it’s a shame that it happened, but we don’t blame anyone. We just find solutions.”
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That resilient mindset is exactly what his team has been working to cultivate. His crew chief, Matt Swiderski, has seen growth in how Suárez handles these high-stakes environments.
“In the past, one of the issues he had was where he just put a ton of pressure on himself and he built these weekends up,” Swiderski said. “If we went to COTA and he had a bunch of fans there, the first little bump or hiccup we came to would completely deflate him. So we’ve worked on coming into the weekend with a neutral mindset. You know there’s going to be bumps in the road, and honestly, I think he’s done really well.”
“We didn’t start practice where we wanted to, we didn’t quite end where we wanted to, but we’ve made some gains, and he seems to be in a pretty positive mindset and pretty engaged. So he’s balancing it pretty well.”
That progress has Suárez cautiously optimistic about Sunday.
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“For me, it’s everything about execution. You know, I continue to improve our race cars,” Suárez said. “My car, the first practice, I was not happy at all with it, but second practice, I was OK with it. I’m happier. I’m not super happy, but I’m happier. So I’m OK with that. I’m OK starting here and making progress here. Now we have to continue to make that car a little better.
“I don’t believe that we fired off from out of the hauler as the best car, but I believe that we are slowly heading into that group of cars. So, once we get into that group of cars, it’s a free game. You know, it’s anyone’s race, and I feel like my job is to continue to push our group to continue to make these cars better and execute the best possible race that we can.”
Suárez will have to earn every spot on Sunday — no special treatment, even with the spotlight on him. But in a field full of hungry drivers, there’s also a collective understanding: you don’t mess with the country’s golden son in his own backyard, especially in front of a packed house of passionate fans.
“You do not want to spin out Suárez here, I can tell you that,” Michael McDowell said bluntly. “That is not a part of your strategy for the weekend.”
Shane van Gisbergen, a fellow Trackhouse Racing driver, joked: “If I spin out the 99, I’ll be hiding undercover, trying to get out of this place.”
Bubba Wallace put it even more directly: “There’s one goal this weekend — it’s to not wreck Suárez. … I’m definitely adopting that rule.”
That level of respect isn’t lost on his longstanding Trackhouse teammate Ross Chastain, who’s watched Suárez thrive in the buildup to this weekend.
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“Daniel is already next level on road courses, but coming back here to Mexico, I’ve seen the pride in him,” Chastain said. “He told us about this race well before it was announced, and I’ve just been excited to be his teammate for a weekend like this.”
As the only Mexican-born driver in the field, Suárez stands at the center of something bigger than racing — a symbol of national pride, surrounded by support and fueled by passion. Whether he can cap it off with a win remains to be seen, but no matter what, he’s already the superstar of the weekend.