Daniel Suárez’s untold story that says everything about NASCAR hero Kyle Busch
Stories about the late Kyle Busch have rained down all weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
They’ve made us laugh at his brashness, tremble at his greatness, tear up at any number of things — most notably his love of being a father.
But on Friday, just as NASCAR CEO Steve O’Donnell was reeling off his own personal stories of the American “badass” and all-time great driver, he nearly stopped himself before sharing another. It was a previously untold story — one that says everything you need to know about the late NASCAR hero.
“I hope he doesn’t mind me sharing this,” O’Donnell began, referencing Busch, who put a lot into keeping up his competitive, take-no-prisoners veneer.
O’Donnell continued anyway: “Daniel Suárez comes over from Mexico. Still learning English, learning how to race at the national series level, struggling.
“He received a call every week from Kyle Busch. Never talked about. It was just, ‘How do I make you better?’”
On Saturday, standing in the media center with a Kyle Busch shirt on, Suárez filled in the details of that story. It started with a conversation in 2015 with Steve deSouza at Joe Gibbs Racing, where deSouza told Suárez: “Kyle, he loves to help young talent. Give him a call.”
Kyle Busch? Loves helping his competitors? And I should just give him a call?!
“I mean, I could barely speak English!” Suárez told reporters Saturday. “So I connected with him, and I used to ask him and say, ‘Hey, do you mind if I give you a call next week too?’”
That turned into a call every week that season. And it was that season — the 2015 one in which Busch had two significant lower-body injuries, missed several races and still won the Cup championship.
“Every single race in 2015. I remember, in the second half of the year, I just kept asking him,” said Suárez, who was a rookie in the O’Reilly Series at the time. “I was the kind of person, I was a sponge. I wanted as much information as possible. And I remember when I started getting good, and we started racing together, and he said, ‘I think you’re getting too good. I think I need to stop helping you.’
“But he always continued to help me. So to me that was very impactful.”
Suárez, who finished 2015 as O’Reilly Series Rookie of the Year and then in 2016 won an O’Reilly Series championship, shrugged. They talked about race strategy. About which car setups suit which racetracks. About preparation.
“A lot of people don’t know that, right?” Suárez said. “A lot of people know Kyle as the villain. As the guy, you either loved him or hated him. But he had a huge heart.”
Kyle Busch affected everyone in NASCAR
Suárez had other stories about his connection to Busch. Like partying in Mexico City together when NASCAR ran there. Like offering advice when Busch got into some legal trouble in Cancún in 2023. And the truth is, drivers all across the garage have their own connections to him that aren’t publicized at all.
Like how Joey Logano remembered a basketball game at Talladega. Or how Kyle Larson remembered the weekends lugging their kids to different racetracks to watch them race go-karts or Legends cars. Or how Joe Gibbs, his longtime car owner, laughed about how he interacted with sponsors. Or how Chase Elliott remembered all the “lessons” Busch taught him on the racetrack.
The numbers alone tell a pretty remarkable story. At least 11 drivers running in the Cup Series today drove in at least one Truck Series race for Kyle Busch Motorsports. That includes crown-jewel winners Erik Jones, William Byron, Bubba Wallace and Christopher Bell.
Who that doesn’t include? A driver like Zane Smith. The Front Row Motorsports Cup Series driver and former Truck Series champion told a story Saturday about how getting into a racing battle with Busch for the win in a 2021 Charlotte truck race — and Busch later saying nice things about him in the media — helped make Smith’s career.
What did Busch say, exactly?
In Busch’s fiery fashion …
“Who the (expletive) is in that 21?”
Smith was, of course.
“A lot of times, these guys could just be pissed off that I made those moves. But Kyle respected it,” Smith said. “It’s not even a question if I respect Kyle. I think everybody in this industry has a tremendous amount of respect for him, with just what he accomplished. It seemed impossible until he did it. He just gave oxygen to my career. I’m always in debt to him for that.”
That wasn’t the last time he said something like this, either.
“We raced later at Texas, and I think he said, ‘I don’t got what Zane’s got’ after I passed him there,” Smith said. “And I feel like that is what really sparked my career.”
‘That speaks to who he is’
Examples of this are endless — across the NASCAR industry.
“I guarantee you there are a lot of drivers that he had an impact on,” Suárez said. “And that’s what made him special. Every single driver here has had a different journey. And I’m pretty sure that he’s had an impact on many of these guys.
“For me, coming from Mexico, I have a way different journey than most drivers. And for him, it was going to be very easy to not care, not put too much time into me. Maybe a call. Maybe two calls. But 30 calls? Thirty-five calls a year? From a driver like this?
“That speaks to who he is. Not as a driver, but as a person.”
This story was originally published May 23, 2026 at 5:02 PM.
