Daniel Suárez reacts to Ty Gibbs, Tyler Reddick incident at Richmond

Right before the halfway point in tonight’s Cook Out 400, Daniel Suárez got into Ty Gibbs, who spun Tyler Reddick. It took the 45 out of contention for the win tonight in one of only a few cautions on the night.

Tyler Reddick was one of a handful of drivers who had a chance to race for the win tonight. With his teammate Bubba Wallace, 23XI Racing led 164 laps tonight. But neither driver would finish on the lead lap. In fact, all four 23XI cars finished multiple laps down tonight.

Daniel Suárez is the car that started the whole incident. The 99 got into Ty Gibbs, who was slower at the time due to tire strategy. The 54 went up and got into Reddick. Then it was pretty much all she wrote from that point for the 45 team.

“I mean, I feel bad for the 45, I think it was. It really wasn’t intentional, the last thing I wanted was to crash him for no reason,” Suárez said after the race, via Bob Pockrass of FOX Sports. “The 54 already had older tires, and at that point, it’s a two, three-second difference, you know? And when he went to the ottom, he slowed down way more than I anticipated. SO, I bumped him a little bit to get some room. But just maybe a little bit too hard of a bump for the tires that he had. He got a wiggle, and then he ended up spinning out the 45, which really wasn’t intentional. Feel bad for that, but yeah, just a bad situation there. Just trying to make as much time as possible.”

Daniel Suárez had one of his best performances of the season tonight at Richmond. A P7 finish as he heads to Daytona in a must-win situation to make the NASCAR Playoffs. The Trackhouse Racing driver will not return to the 99 car in 2026 as the team has decided to move on from the Mexican-American driver.

Two P7 finishes in a row now for Suárez shows that he is still a serviceable Cup Series driver. His 2026 plans remain a mystery. There doesn’t appear to be many places in the Cup Series for him to go, but perhaps a top Xfinity Series team could take a chance on Suárez?

Winning the Mexico City race with JR Motorsports showed the 2016 Xfinity Series champion can still get it done at that level. Getting into a good ride in that series might be enough to restart his career back to Cup and a competitive ride.

Tonight, Daniel Suárez made mistakes, but didn’t let them end his own race. He knows he messed up, but a lot of racing comes down to timing and right place at the right time. It also comes down to wrong place at the wrong time. That’s where Reddick happened to be when Suárez bumped Gibbs.