Races August 30, 2021August 31, 2021 Wrecked Racing For Win on Final Lap Date: Aug. 28th, 2021 Event: Coke Zero Sugar 400 (Round 26 of 36) Series: NASCAR Cup Series Location: Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway (2.5-mile oval) Format: 160 laps, broken into three stages (50 laps/50 laps/60 laps) Start/Finish: 26th / 19th (Accident, completed 164 of 165 laps) Point Standing: 25th with 441 points Notes: Daniel Suárez finished 19th in Saturday night’s Coke Zero Sugar 400 NASCAR Cup Series race at the Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway. Suárez is 25th in the season standings after 26 races. Suárez started 26th with the plan to intentionally stay at the back of the field until it was time to win the race. He executed that strategy avoiding a handful of accidents midway through the race then moving to 25th with just 17 laps remaining. A wreck on the backstretch after the restart damaged the No. 99 and it seemed chances for victory were gone. Quick repairs saw Suárez restart the race in 25th with 10 to go. When the green flag waved, he stayed in the high lane as the drivers raced three and four abreast. Another accident with three laps to go saw Suárez weave his way through wrecked race cars and carnage to move to eighth. The accident forced an overtime finish that saw Suárez jump from eighth to third on the final lap. Just as we was about to overtake Kevin Harvick for second and battle Ryan Blaney for his first career victory, Suarez was clipped by another car triggering a multicar accident that left him with a 20th-place finish While Suárez did not make the 16-driver, 10 race playoffs, he will still run the final 10 races with plans on winning and climbing higher in the points as well as getting ready for the 2022 season. Suárez wore a Whoop strap during the race allowing NBC race viewers to monitor his heart rate and breathing during the close racing on the Daytona highbanks. The Cup Series will return to action Sunday Sept. 5 at the Southern 500 at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway. NBCSN will televise Sunday’s race at 6 p.m. EDT. Daniel Suárez, driver of the No. 99 CommScope Chevrolet Camaro for Trackhouse Racing: “What a shame. I thought we had a chance to get the CommScope Chevrolet to victory lane. We had a great strategy and fast car tonight. My spotter really guided me through some of those wrecks. He drove the car. At the end we just got clipped going for the win. We have been in position to win at least two of these races this year. We will get one soon.”
