The home stretch of its first full NASCAR Cup Series season is at hand for the No. 96 Coca-Cola Toyota Camry team for Gaunt Brothers Racing (GBR) and its driver Daniel Suárez as they head to Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway for Sunday’s Bank of America Roval 400.
It will be the 32nd of 36 points-paying races on the 2020 schedule for the single-car operation that joined the elite Cup Series ranks as a part-time team in 2017 and embarked on its first full campaign last January. It also marks the second and final road-course event of the season – the first coming in August on the 3.61-mile, 14-turn layout at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway after this year’s traditional road-course stops at Sonoma (Calif.) Raceway and Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International were cancelled due to COVID-19.
Sunday’s 400-mile race on the 2.28-mile, 17-turn Charlotte “roval” will be another valuable data-gathering session for GBR as it looks ahead to taking another step in its evolution into a championship-contending Cup Series team during the 2021 season, which features not only a return to the road courses at Sonoma and Watkins Glen, but the addition of the circuits at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, and the grand prix layout at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
A special Coca-Cola paint scheme will adorn GBR’s No. 96 Toyota Camry Sunday in celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month – Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 – and its 28-year-old driver from Monterrey, Mexico will be hosting his first and only Daniel’s Amigos fan event prior to the race, albeit in a virtual setting thanks again to the pandemic.
Hispanic Heritage Month recognizes the contributions and influence of Hispanic Americans to the history, culture and achievements of the United States. The colorful paint scheme on the No. 96 GBR Toyota for this weekend was inspired by local Saltillo Sarape artists from Suárez’s hometown, and features a message in Spanish that connects Hispanic heritage to the racing world – “El orgullo nos guia,” which translates to “Pride leads the way.”
So as it heads to the Charlotte roval with an eye toward 2021 and beyond, the No. 96 Coca-Cola Toyota team for GBR looks to continue building on the progress made during its busiest season of racing to date, and celebrate Hispanic heritage along the way.
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