The car they rolled out of the hauler was not that fast, though, only 22nd fastest in the first practice session. During qualifying, he managed the 13th fastest speed in the first round and advanced. But he was only 20th fastest in the second round, ending his qualifying attempts. The final two practice sessions saw him in 16th and 6th, so perhaps his team found some speed in his Stanley Camry.
Before the race they found something wrong with one his tires. As a result of changing tires he had to drop to the back of the field during the warm-up laps, so he was in 31st place on lap 1. During an early-race caution on lap 7, Scott Graves, his crew chief, called him down pit road for 4 tires, giving them strategy options during the upcoming competition caution. Those 4 fresh tires allowed him to moved up to 21st place by the competition caution on lap 25. And because they had just recently put 4 fresh tires on, this time down pit road they went with a 2-tire stop. When the race resumed on lap 30, Daniel was perched in 16th place. He spent the rest of stage 1 and all of stage 2 ranging between 14th and 19th place, finishing stage 1 in 19th and stage 2 in 18th.
Because their green-flag pit stop occurred just 6 laps before the end of stage 2, they were able to stay out during the stage-break caution. When the race resumed on lap 126, the 19 team restarted in 10th. Over the next 25 laps he ranged from 7th to 12th. But during the lap 151 caution, Daniel overshot his pit box. The extra second or two needed to back up the car had him coming off pit road in 20th.
During the next 25 laps, his position ranged from 18th to 21st. Then again during the next caution, Graves kept Daniel on the track, enabled them to restart in 12th. One lap later, another caution, and another decision to stay out, this time restarting in 10th. With only 10 laps to go, it looked like Daniel had a good shot at another top ten. And with gas mileage on everybody's minds, who knows? Maybe even a top five.
But instead of the bad luck hitting his competitors, this time the bad luck hit Daniel. Ahead of him, cars on older tires struggled on the restart. The resulting pingponging of cars found the 19 car in three- and four-wide situations. Those situations seldom resolve themselves without something bad happening to someone. Eventually someone from behind caught the back corner of his Stanley Toyota, hooking him toward the infield.
A car on his inside combined with some pretty fancy driving kept his car from spinning out of the control, but enough damage was done that they had to come down pit road for repairs and 4 fresh tires. Daniel restarted in 26th, and with only 5 laps remaining in the race, he was only able to advance 2 spots.
He ended the day in 24th place, earning 13 points, bringing his season total up to 313 points. He remains 19th in the drivers' standings. He finished 11 spots behind Erik Jones, losing more ground to him, now 33 points back. But even though he finished 4 spots behind Ty Dillon, he is still a strong 49 points ahead of him.
And on the separate rookie standings, here are the current numbers:
- Daniel Suarez --166
- Erik Jones -- 160
- Ty Dillon -- 145
- Corey LaJoie -- 114
- Gray Gaulding -- 101
Next week the Cup series heads to California for the first road course of the season. It will be fun to see how Daniel does on road courses. Anybody know if he has had any experience on road courses in Mexico?
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