Michael McDowell set the record straight on his contact with Carson Hocevar at Watkins Glen last week. While speaking with Dustin Long of NBC Sports, McDowell said the incident with his Spire Motorsports teammate was simply miscommunication. “So Turn 1, just miscommunication and misjudged it,” Michael McDowell explained. I thought [Hocevar] was actually rolling out […]
Michael McDowell set the record straight on his contact with Carson Hocevar at Watkins Glen last week. While speaking with Dustin Long of NBC Sports, McDowell said the incident with his Spire Motorsports teammate was simply miscommunication.
“So Turn 1, just miscommunication and misjudged it,” Michael McDowell explained. I thought [Hocevar] was actually rolling out to let me go by, and he was rolling out to try to get a run. When I peeked in, I thought, ‘Oh, he’s just (letting) me go.’ When he turned it, I was like ‘Oh no.’
“Really, it was just a miscommunication on what he was doing versus what I was doing. It was super unintentional, and obviously that’s not we want to have happened, but it happened. Can’t undo it, we can just move to the future and do better.”
Carson Hocevar gives update on incident with Michael McDowell
Carson Hocevar got spun by McDowell during the final stage of the Watkins Glen race, but the two drivers made contact several times last Sunday. After the incident, Hocevar told his team on the radio, “I don’t want to talk to [McDowell], look at him, do not let him near me.”
On Wednesday, Hocevar spoke to reporters and was asked if he had spoken to McDowell. “No, we hadn’t talked or whatever. He wanted to sit down at Richmond,” Hocevar said, per NASCAR.com. “I’m gone racing, and he’s gone as well. Maybe it’s best-case scenario that we’re both gone. It didn’t seem like that big of a deal to me — either he made a mistake or misjudged and obviously turned me. Then we were just fighting for the last lap and last corner and felt like that was plenty of OK to do considering the contact right. I can play defense for one corner to try to get the spot.”
McDowell and Hocevar will need to win one of the last two NASCAR Cup Series races to clinch a playoff spot. McDowell, who won the 2021 Daytona 500, has reached the playoffs in 2021 and 2023. Hocevar is in his second season as a full-time Cup Series driver and is looking for his first Cup Series race victory.
Category: General Sports
