A week after a heated exchange with veteran Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and a fine from his team for posting a controversial social media take on the Mexico City race weekend, Spire Motorsports’ Carson Hocevar faced the media Saturday morning at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway and conceded he could have handled things a little better in both instances.
“Yes,” he conceded, he fully expects Stenhouse to exact revenge after a dust-up the two had on track in Mexico – the second time Stenhouse has been miffed at the 22-year-old in a race. And “yes,” Hocevar said, posting a negative review online before actually getting a chance to experience Mexico, was also wrong. Both things are a learning experience.
Hocevar, who drives the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet, said he had not yet spoken with Stenhouse since the trip to Mexico, but doubted, at this point, there was anything he could say that would make a difference to the veteran as they came to Pocono for Sunday’s The Great American Getaway 400 (2 p.m. ET on Amazon Prime, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
“I feel like we have a good relationship or had one,” Hocevar said. “I was just running behind him, just kind of logging laps and just locked up in a very dumb spot. And it was just so dumb, really. Just a mistake that didn’t need to happen and didn’t want it to happen.
“But there’s nothing that I could do or say. You know, I can’t buy him a Hallmark card and, really make things better. So, it sucks. It sucks for me because he’s the only NASCAR driver that owns a sprint car team, and I love sprint cars. So, it sucks because I want to go talk to him about sprint cars. So, yeah, hopefully everything can be set, but I know that the scorecard has me ahead right now, unfortunately.”
As for the social media post, initially uncomplimentary of his early Mexico experience, Hocevar was fined $50,000 by his Spire Motorsports team. He explained that his words were written before really having an opportunity to explore Mexico City.
“The issue wasn’t for the team having their kind of frustrations that I’m giving my opinion and putting it out there – it’s just the fact that, you know, my opinion wasn’t my opinion,” Hocevar said. “It was just based off everything else, you know, that I’ve heard or seen, right? I didn’t go do my own homework and voice my own opinion. I didn’t give it a shot. I didn’t give it a chance. I didn’t go walk around. I didn’t go see it.
“When I did then hindsight’s 20/20, then I have my own opinion. But I’ve already put it out there. So, I think that was the biggest thing was like — I wasn’t doing what I pride myself of doing. I was just having my own opinion, putting it out there and being me. I just didn’t give it a fair shot, so I think that’s where it all stems from.”
