After another weekend where Carson Hocevar ruffled some feathers on the racetrack, Dale Earnhardt Jr. senses that driver frustration with the 22-year-old is “building to something.” To this point in the season, Hocevar has upset drivers such as Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Brad Keselowski and Zane Smith. Then in Sunday’s race at Watkins Glen International, he […]
After another weekend where Carson Hocevar ruffled some feathers on the racetrack, Dale Earnhardt Jr. senses that driver frustration with the 22-year-old is “building to something.” To this point in the season, Hocevar has upset drivers such as Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Brad Keselowski and Zane Smith.
Then in Sunday’s race at Watkins Glen International, he got sent spinning by Spire Motorsports teammate Michael McDowell. Hocevar responded by dooring him after crossing the start-finish line on the final lap. Notably, Hocevar hasn’t yet been involved in a major incident with a driver from Hendrick Motorsports. If that happens, you could see Hocevar’s decision making behind the wheel change, Earnhardt said on the “Dale Jr. Download.”
“We said this months and months ago — everything’s fine until he runs into one of Rick’s cars or something like that and he has to go into the office and talk to Rick Hendrick. It might not be Rick, but it’ll be a person like Rick that when he has to go in and have that conversation, that will have an effect. That might not fix it all, but that will have an effect on the decision making behind the wheel,” Earnhardt said. “I’m entertained by Hocevar until it becomes my problem. I think it’s all fine until he does something that irks Hendrick. Or somebody that’s directly above his chain of command. In the Cup race, him and McDowell racing each other to the finish — that might get some conversations going. You don’t know if they’re gonna pin that on McDowell and let Carson off the hook.
“… If he goes out there and impedes a lap for [Kyle] Larson and the big man gets upset, because the big man has some influence over Spire and has influence over most things Chevrolet. When you start messing with what his program is doing or what he’s trying to accomplish, that’s when the vice gets a little tight and Carson will feel that. Until that happens, until his crew chief or owners outright go ‘Carson, stop it,’ he’s not gonna make the adjustments because he doesn’t have to or need to — doesn’t feel like he needs to, not gonna change or alter his style. … It’s building to something and it’s gonna be worth watching. I’m entertained wondering how this is gonna play out.”
Carson Hocevar is still causing problems
Hendrick has done this before. Before Hocevar, it was Ross Chastain. And in 2023, Chastain often caused chaos on the racetrack. After Chastain wrecked Larson three times in a four-race span due to Chastain’s actions, Hendrick called him out publicly.
“He doesn’t have to be that aggressive,” Hendrick said of Chastain. “I guess at this point in the race maybe you’re super aggressive. But you just don’t run people up in the fence. He’s going to make a lot of enemies. It’s hard to win a championship when you’ve got a lot of paybacks out there.”
From time to time, Chastain still causes problems, but it’s less frequent than what we saw in 2022 and 2023. Many point to Hendrick’s public criticism as the turning point. Perhaps it could be the same for Hocevar, though he already seems to be looking to make amends with some.
Late in the race at Watkins Glen, Hocevar pulled to the side on the exit of Turn 5 and allowed Smith to go by him for 17th. Hocevar approached Smith’s car on pit road after the race. He leaned into his car and said, “Hey, I know that doesn’t make up for it, but you can expect that in the next couple weeks, OK?”
Hocevar is trying to pay back favors on the racetrack. We’ll see if this works for him throughout the rest of the season.
Category: General Sports
