Rookie finishes fourth in Kentucky XFINITY, Truck Series races
SPARTA, Ky. — The progress thus far of NASCAR Next product Daniel Suarez has been an upward arc, one that nearly took a significant spike Friday night at Kentucky Speedway.
Though his results in his first full season of NASCAR XFINITY Series competition for Joe Gibbs Racing have been marked by pockets of inconsistency, Suarez’s part-time participation for Kyle Busch Motorsports in the Camping World Truck Series has been a clean 7-for-7 sweep of top-10 finishes. Friday night, the 23-year-old Mexico native took another step toward leveling the XFINITY side.
Fourth-place Suarez was the top-finishing XFINITY Series regular in Friday’s Kentucky 300, logging his second top-five effort this season in just his first race weekend at the 1.5-mile track. The finish came on the heels of another fourth-place finish in a KBM truck the night before in the Bluegrass State — an indication, Suarez said, that dividing his time between both series is helping him improve.
“I feel like just a different driver from a few months ago to right now, and I hope that that I’m a different driver three months from now,” Suarez said with a laugh. “So I really think that is helping me a lot to race in both series and to have that double practice. It’s helping me a lot to learn about the race track, the race car, the communication and everything. So far, it’s working out pretty good.”
Suarez entered the season as a fresh face, but also as a fairly full-fledged rookie. Aside from running the majority of four seasons in the developmental NASCAR K&N Pro Series and NASCAR Mexico Series, Suarez had just three NASCAR national series starts — two in XFINITY, one in trucks. Accordingly, his 2015 schedule was front-loaded to help accelerate his growth.
“The experience of all the stuff he learns on track, it’s hard to teach all of it without just racing every week,” said Eric Phillips, Suarez’s crew chief in the XFINITY Series. “He’s got good trucks to drive over there with KBM, he’s doing a good job, and I think the more seat time we can get him, the better we’ll be.”
Suarez’s elation was heightened by the presence of a special family visitor; the driver said his mother was on hand at Kentucky, watching him race for the first time in the United States. What she saw was a steady, consistent night of racing from her son, who jumped into the top five in the running order after the first caution period and never left it.
As much extra support as he received Friday night in Kentucky, Suarez said he’s been riding a wave of backing from his JGR team ever since embarking on his Sunoco Rookie of the Year campaign.
“They’re a great organization, and the best thing is that they’re an even better family,” Suarez said. “Everybody is a very good group of people and everyone takes care of each other. I stay by myself, I have a real family and everything, but I really see them like my family and they have been supporting me in everything. Just really, really proud to be part of this organization.”