Spotlight on Daniel Suarez as NASCAR visits Mexico City

The spotlight will shine brightly on Trackhouse driver Daniel Suarez as the NASCAR Cup Series visits Autodromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City.

This weekend’s race will be a landmark moment for NASCAR as it hosts its first Cup Series race outside of the United States since 1958.

But it will also be significant for 33-year-old Suarez, who will be driving the #99 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet Camaro in front of his adoring home fans.

Suarez is the only Mexican driver on the Cup Series grid and the only foreign-born driver to have won a NASCAR national title, having triumphed in the Xfinity Series in 2016.

"There are going to be new fans, the fans that don't really know me and they just love racing and they know that there is a Mexican driver,” he said. “They're going to be there with me and there is going to be these fans that they've been supporting me in all my journey.”

The 2025 season has been a tough one so far for two-time Cup Series race winner Suarez, who sits 28th in the championship standings after registering a single podium in the first 16 races.

More concerningly, he doesn’t have a drive for 2026, with his contract with Trackhouse expiring at the end of the year.

While admitting the situation is ‘distracting’ for him, Suarez says he won’t let anything stop him from enjoying his home race.

"It’s not the first time that I've been in this position,” he said. Definitely the first time with the Mexico race, but it's not the first time that I've been in the position that we have to win or in the position that we have a contract negotiation in the middle [of the season].

"It’s definitely a distraction. I won't sit here and tell you that it doesn't really matter. I'm trying to be as smart as possible and to put all this stuff on the side and just do my thing on the track."

He added: "The Mexico race is something that I've been hoping and waiting on for many, many years, and I'm not going to let anything else from outside take that week and that moment from myself.

"We have to just continue to put one foot in front of the other and continue to move forward. I think that in Trackhouse, we have found some decent speed in the last few weeks, so that's promising, and hopefully we can continue to move in that direction."

With three of the next five races running on road courses or street circuits, Suarez is confident that he can turn around his fortunes near the midway point of the season.

"We just have to execute," Suarez said. "We have to do the little things right, and I believe that we're capable of doing that. We win next week, and all these conversations are going to be out of the window."

Suarez has already played a major role in promoting the new Mexico race over the last 12 months and will continue to do so in the run-up to the event.

"There is going to be more on my plate [in Mexico] and I have to accept that," Suarez said. "With that being said, I have to protect my space for the competition stuff because if we don't do the competition stuff, everything else, it doesn't really matter.

"We have to put a balance on everything. [So by] Friday, I can try to focus as much as possible only on racing. I'm going to have still a few things here and there, but for the most part, it is going to be racing."

Also read: NASCAR set for F1-style podium celebration after Mexico Cup Race