CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Daniel Suárez, the only Mexican driver in NASCAR’s top category, has been announced as the replacement for Justin Haley at Spire Motorsports. Suárez, who was the first driver hired by Trackhouse Racing in 2021, will be replaced after five seasons by 19-year-old Connor Zilisch next year.
Suárez hasn’t won any races this year and failed to qualify for the 16-driver playoffs. Haley, for his part, has the No. 7 car in 31st place in the Cup standings, with only two top-10 finishes. Haley achieved the only Cup victory in Spire’s history, winning at Daytona International Speedway in the July 2019 race.This partnership gives Suárez and the No. 7 Chevrolet team the opportunity to show that both are capable of being weekly contenders.
Jeff Dickerson, Co-owner of Spire
Suárez won his two Cup races with Trackhouse and finished 10th in the 2022 standings, his best result to date. Spire will be the fifth team in 10 years for the 2016 Xfinity Series champion. This year, he ranks 28th in the standings, with two top-five finishes and seven top-10 finishes. Suárez mentioned that Dickerson was one of the first people he called when he found out he was no longer part of Trackhouse. Dan Towriss, the CEO of TWG Motorsports, became the majority owner of Spire this year. The NASCAR team joins a racing portfolio that also includes the Cadillac F1 team, which will launch next season, as well as Andretti Global in IndyCar.I think we need each other. We all like a good redemption story and giving people a platform to prove the doubters wrong. Daniel needs to prove to everyone that this year was atypical, and we want to prove to everyone that the performance of car 7 this year was also atypical.
Jeff Dickerson, Co-owner of Spire
Spire has three cars in the Cup: Michael McDowell is 21st in points, Carson Hocevar 23rd, and Haley. The team has three poles, six top 5s, 16 top 10s, and led 233 laps, all season highs for an organization that began competing in 2019. Freeway Insurance, an insurance broker and distributor, will be Suárez’s main sponsor. Suárez will now be under the same umbrella as his Mexican compatriot Sergio Pérez, who will join Valtteri Bottas as the first two Cadillac drivers. Suárez and Pérez usually have significant sponsorship from Mexican entities, but Dickerson said they were not a package for TWG.If you look at the last three years and how Spire Motorsports has grown, three years ago I probably wasn’t considering Spire Motorsports as an option. I think this is the NASCAR team that is growing the fastest, and I want to be a part of that. I know they’re not done yet, they’re just getting started.
Daniel Suárez
There was no decree. We’re a sales-based organization, right? And it’s like, ‘OK, if Checo is in the F1 car, then, you know, we have the opportunity to tap into a passionate fanbase’, and things come together. But you don’t know how that’s going to go, right?
Jeff Dickerson, Co-owner of Spire
