DARLINGTON, S.C. – If you’re going to show up to Darlington Raceway with the markings of a Dale Earnhardt persona, you’re going to have to be the most swashbuckling version of yourself. In Sunday’s hard-fought Goodyear 400, Carson Hocevar did his best to look and act the part.
Hocevar rallied from the rear of the field to a fourth-place finish at the historic, punishing track, matching his best result of the young NASCAR Cup Series season. He gained the last of those positions with five laps remaining, skimming past two-time Darlington winner Chase Briscoe and lap-down Austin Dillon with a dashing three-wide move, offering a chipper “that was cool” on the team radio as he cleared both into Turn 1.
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In a Friday availability, Hocevar said he hadn’t exactly embraced the Earnhardt comparisons and how they’ve been construed. But here he was Sunday, decked out in cowboy hat swagger with a retro Earnhardt-inspired design on his No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet – the brainchild of his team and sponsors who put the throwback look together.
“They put a lot of pressure on me. Honestly, I was feeling it a lot,” Hocevar said. “Yeah, it’s good to just give it a good run. The last thing I really wanted to do is kind of come in here and run in the 20s or just run mediocre. So it’s good to kind of go last to fourth and be a hard charger here.”
Charging was Hocevar’s only option after unapproved pre-race adjustments to replace an upper control arm sent him to the rear of the 37-car field in pace laps. Thanks to the dazzling pace set up front by early leaders Tyler Reddick – the eventual winner – and a rejuvenated Brad Keselowski, Hocevar went a lap down in the first stage.
After a Stage 2 spin by Erik Jones prompted a caution flag, No. 77 crew chief Luke Lambert elected to use the wave-around rule to place Hocevar back on the lead lap. The 23-year-old Michigan native was 16th by the end of the second stage, but came alive in the home stretch with a methodical march forward, adapting well to a new rules package that left drivers struggling for grip and battling tire wear.
“I enjoyed it. It seemed like everybody else was fighting it a lot more than me,” Hocevar said. “So it’s good that I could get around them and make it. If everybody stops driving good, it’s hard to take advantage of your stuff, so I think our stuff was pretty good. The sort of gap of the field allowed me to be able to pull off passes as well.”
The outcome was another development that has encouraged Spire Motorsports, which also brought Daniel Suárez home in seventh to place a pair inside the top 10. Hocevar, who also finished fourth at EchoPark Speedway earlier this season, jumped two spots to 13th in the Cup Series points after a resilient Darlington day.
“Look, I think it just kind of shows you how far he’s come,” Spire Motorsports co-owner Jeff Dickerson told NASCAR.com. “He kept it mostly together today, but great job by the 77 group on strategy to get him back on the lead lap and digging, and then we could reset the race after that second stage, and then, man, they just [expletive] took off. It was unbelievable. Fastest car on the race track at the end. I mean, it’s a shame we were like 10 seconds behind (Reddick), but again, I think the right side is clean, I think he’s earned some respect again out there. It’s kind of metaphorical. You can tell we’re pretty happy. We’ve got two in the top 10, and obviously, best Chevy.
“I think I’m just more happy with how they just kind of stayed in it. I mean, it’s not lost on me that it’s always been a challenge for us to put 500 miles together any weekend when we’ve qualified well, let alone have to come through the back. And so I’m just really proud of our entire group with two in the top 10, and we keep getting some separation in points. I mean, points matter now just as much as they do in August, but you know, when Carson gets locked in, man, we’re going to be really, really good.”