NASCAR Cup Series Driver Daniel Suarez & Trackhouse Racing Announce That They Will Part Ways After 2025

And here we go…

It was supposed to be a relatively tame silly season in NASCAR, with most Cup Series drivers locked into their contracts at least through 2026 and safe in knowing where they would be driving next season.

One of the only questions was whether Daniel Suarez would be returning to the #99 car for Trackhouse Racing next season. The Mexico native was the first driver hired by Trackhouse owner Justin Marks and his then-co-owner Pitbull when they launched their race team in 2021. Since then, he’s struggled to find consistent success in the car, winning only two races for Trackhouse during his four and a half years with the team, including a win at the road course in Sonoma back in 2022 and a thriller in Atlanta last year.

Over his four full seasons with Trackhouse, Suarez has only made the playoffs twice and only has one top 10 finish in the final standings. Meanwhile, his teammate Ross Chastain has won 6 races in only three and a half years with the team, making the playoffs in two of his three seasons with Trackhouse and advancing to the championship race back in 2023.

There also seemed to be some frustration from Suarez that he wasn’t getting the resources that Chastain was getting. While he never outright said it, he made some comments that made it sound like he wasn’t necessarily happy with his position within the team.

Trackhouse has also signed NASCAR Xfinity Series driver Connor Zilisch, a phenom who has been dominating in the lower series and who many expect to be ready to move to the Cup Series next year. But with only three charters, and the #88 car filled by Shane Van Gisbergen, it seemed like Suarez would be the odd man out – especially after the departure of Pitbull from his ownership role with the team.

And today, the team and Suarez made it official.

In a statement, Trackhouse Racing owner Justin Marks announced that team and Suarez have mutually agreed to part ways at the end of the 2025 season:

“The role Daniel has played in the Trackhouse origin story and its first five years will remain a valued part of the company’s history forever. His commitment, work ethic and dedication to the effort is one of the most impressive things I personally have seen in my career.

We will forever be thankful and honored that Daniel chose to spend many incredible years with us. We are proud of his wins, his successes, the growth of his brand, and his emergence as a valuable athlete in America’s greatest motorsport. But, most of all, I’m proud of him as a friend. I’m truly excited to see what awaits him in the next chapter of his amazing career. We are grateful for the professionalism, effort and heart he’s brought to our organization.”

Suarez also released a statement to his “amigos,” calling his time at Trackhouse the best of his NASCAR Cup Series career, which has included stops at Joe Gibbs Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing:

“Trackhouse and I have mutually agreed to part ways at the end of the 2025 season. I’ve had some of the best years of my Cup Series career at Trackhouse. We had great successes as a team and I gained some incredible friends. We took a team nobody had even heard of in 2021 and in just a couple of years we were winning races and running upfront on a weekly basis.

Just like the seasons in a year, sometimes things change and we have agreed to each go in our own direction. I wish Trackhouse nothing but the best, this 99 team will always be special to me. And like I always say, The best is ahead!”

While the team hasn’t named a replacement, it’s widely expected that the 18-year old Zilisch will move up to the Cup Series next season.

As for Suarez, his options may be limited as far as a landing spot. There are always questions surrounding the future of Alex Bowman in the #48 car at Hendrick Motorsports, but even if they do choose to replace Bowman (I don’t think they will, for the record), I have a hard time seeing Hendrick taking a chance on a veteran driver like Suarez who has struggled at his previous stops.

One wrench that could be thrown into Silly Season is the lawsuit against NASCAR that was filed by 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports. As it stands right now, an appeals court recently vacated an injunction requiring NASCAR to allow the teams to run as chartered teams. The teams are appealing the ruling, but if they’re unsuccessful and NASCAR chooses to take their charters, we still don’t know what would happen to those six charters. There would no doubt be a market for them, with teams like Rick Ware Racing and Legacy Motor Club already announcing that they hoped to expand in the coming years.

Could Suarez fill one of those rides if that does end up happening? He would definitely be one of the top drivers on the market. Or could he end up back in the Xfinity Series, where he won a championship in 2016?

We’ll have to wait and see. This is just the first domino to fall in Silly Season, but it obviously won’t be the last.The post NASCAR Cup Series Driver Daniel Suarez & Trackhouse Racing Announce That They Will Part Ways After 2025 first appeared on Whiskey Riff.