Hocevar “Just One Spot Short” In Bid For Atlanta Win

Carson Hocevar (77) and Josh Berry race during Sunday's Ambetter Health 400 at Atlanta Motor Speedway (Max Corcoran/Race Face Digital Photo)

HAMPTON, Ga. – Though he never led during Sunday’s Ambetter Health 400 at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Carson Hocevar capped off his career day with a runner-up finish, the best result of his still young NASCAR Cup Series career.

The second-year driver out of Portage, Mich., qualified his No. 77 Delaware Life Chevrolet in the 26th spot on the grid but clawed himself up to ninth by the end of stage one, securing two additional bonus points in doing so.

The second stage featured more carnage, but Hocevar kept his Spire Motorsports machine ahead of it all, improving to seventh by the time the penultimate stage concluded, gaining another four stage points in the process.

That all meant the day was already productive for the 22-year-old, with six extra points from the stages, but the big prize was still on the line. As the intensity picked up toward the end, Hocevar’s seemingly clean day was put into jeopardy before he nearly became a star in the end.

With less than 30 laps to go, Hocevar was running sixth in the thick of the lead pack when he made contact with polesitter Ryan Blaney, spinning Blaney’s No. 12 Team Penske Ford Mustang through turns one and two.

Hocevar continued to run toward the front, firing off from third on the last restart of the race. He held his ground and made a three-wide bid through the middle for the lead, a bid that might have stuck had NASCAR not thrown a caution for a crash on the backstretch on the last lap that swept up Josh Berry and others.

After NASCAR’s video review of the finish, they ruled Hocevar finished second, sandwiched between race winner Christopher Bell and third-place finisher Kyle Larson.

Hocevar’s previous best finish was third in last year’s race at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International. This was Spire’s second runner-up finish since their lone Cup Series win at Daytona (Fla.) Int’l Speedway in July 2019. Zane Smith finished second for the team at Nashville (Tenn.) Superspeedway last June.

Upon climbing from his race car, Hocevar was greeted on pit road by fellow competitors Ross Chastain and Ryan Blaney, who each had a conversation with him in the wake of Hocevar’s multiple aggressive moves in the closing laps.

The reigning Cup Series rookie-of-the-year declined to expand on what was said, but still admitted he wasn’t quite satisfied despite coming as close as he ever has to a win at NASCAR’s highest level.

“I’ll just leave [the conversations] to myself,” Hocevar said. “There’s some stuff I[‘ve] got to learn and clean up a little bit.

“I feel like we put ourselves in the perfect opportunity to try and win a race. I've never had that opportunity really before, especially on a superspeedway,” Hocevar said. “Just a big day today for everybody at Spire Motorsports. They deserve all the praise. I just get to hold the wheel and run wide open and just try to put myself in a decent spot.

“Unfortunately … it was just one spot short.”

Hocevar and the NASCAR Cup Series travel next to the newly reconfigured Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.

Coverage of the EchoPark Texas Grand Prix begins at 3:30 p.m. ET on FOX, the Performance Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90, with in-car cameras streaming exclusively on MAX.