Daniel Suarez risks angering wife over birth of child - 'I'm not missing a race'

Oscar Maung-Haley Fri, July 31, 2026 at 2:11 PM UTC

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Daniel Suarez and Julia Piquet got married in July 2024 (Image: Getty)

NASCAR star Daniel Suarez has said he will not be at the birth of his child if it clashes with a Sunday Cup Series race while sitting alongside his wife, Julia Piquet.

With NASCAR taking a week off this weekend, the next time Suarez and his Cup Series counterparts take the track will be August 9 for the Iowa Corn 350, as the race to secure a place in The Chase heats up. Having done away with the old 'win and you're in' format this past offseason, The Chase will see the top 16 scorers in points qualify for the postseason this year, with Suarez, who won the Coca-Cola 600 back in May, currently sitting 11th.

The Cup Series race at Iowa is the first of the last four regular-season races before the playoffs. Suarez is bidding to make the Cup Series playoffs for a third time, having previously done so in 2022 and 2024. But this year, things may be complicated by the arrival of his and wife Julia Piquet's firstborn.

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The pair, who married in 2024, announced back in April 2026 that they were expecting, with Baby Piquet due in early September just as the postseason action kicks off. Earlier this week, Suarez and Piquet hosted a special episode of 'Bless Your Hardt', a podcast usually hosted by Dale Earnhardt Jr. and his wife Amy, who were away on vacation.

And it was during that episode that Suarez explained how he has no intention of missing a Cup Series playoff race should the baby be born on a Sunday. "What's the plan if you're racing and Julia goes into labor? Are you finishing the race or are we just going to miss the race? We've seen drivers do a little bit of everything," Suarez was asked during the podcast.

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Suarez replied, "Yeah, you know, that's a great question. Honestly, I don't have a plan. I don't really have a plan. I know that Julia doesn't want me to miss a race.

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"And obviously we're going to be on the playoffs, so I can't miss a race. So I think that it depends where we are, depends on the time, maybe if the baby was coming Saturday, maybe missing a Saturday will be okay, right now. If it's somewhere close.

"But not Sunday. Like Sunday, I'm not missing a race. I just can't. Being in the playoffs, being so competitive with the team and we have just so many great things that we're building that I just can't."

Suarez also added that he would have missed a race last season had he won one and qualified automatically for the postseason, before explaining that he was confident that he would be there when his and Piquet's child is born.

"If this was the previous format of NASCAR and we are not in the playoffs yet and we've already won a race, oh that's fine [to miss Sunday]. It's not a big deal," he added.

"I'm not worried about it because I'm confident things are gonna work out. I don't know how. But I'm confident that I'm gonna be there with Julia when the baby is born."

And Piquet also believes Suarez will be in attendance, in part because she believes her body won't go into labor on a Sunday due to not feeling safe without her husband by her side.

"And obviously this doesn't always happen but I feel like as a woman your body knows when you feel safe right," said Piquet. "And so I wouldn't feel safe if he's not there. So I trust my body it's going to come when he's around."

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Source: “AOL Sports”