Chase Elliott’s suspension has opened up unexpected opportunities for this weekend’s Cup Series race at Gateway. Not only will Corey LaJoie run a Cup Series race for Hendrick Motorsports, and Carson Hocevar will get his first career Cup Series start. It has been quite the road for Hocevar to get to the Cup Series, so how did he get here?
Carson Hocevar first showed up in the ARCA Menards Series in 2018 at the age of 15. In his second career start, he won the pole, finishing fourth at his home-state track Berlin Raceway in Michigan.
Still too young to run the superspeedways, Hocevar entered 12 ARCA Menards Series Races in 2019, earning his second career pole at Salem and 10 more top-10 finishes. He would also get his first career Truck Series start for Jordan Anderson at Eldora, finishing 26th. However, he got seven more Truck Series starts in 2020 for Niece Motorsports.
Hocever impressed enough to be signed on for a full-time ride with Niece Motorsports for the 2021 season. He also won the prestigious Winchester 400 late model race in Winchester Speedway in October of 2020 as well. For perspective, this is a race won by drivers such as Rusty Wallace, Mark Martin, Kyle Busch, Chase Elliot, and Erik Jones.
Still a relatively new team, Niece Motorsports and Hocevar went through some struggles during 2021 and 2022. In 2021, Hocevar started the season with his best career finish of fifth at Daytona. After that, six straight races outside of the top-10. He would rebound with finishes of third, seventh, and second at Darlington, COTA, and Charlotte respectively.
Hocevar qualified for the playoffs in 2021, but he was eliminated after the first round. In 2022, Hocevar and his team got a little bit better. He equaled his amount of top 5s from the season before going into Gateway, when a hard crash caused Hocevar to sustain a broken ankle.
How did he respond? He nabbed his first career pole at Sonoma the following week, but would have to drop to the back due to a crash during the session. Hocevar would qualify for the playoffs once again, but he failed to win a race, finishing second three times. He would find himself in the center of controversy for crashing Colby Howard at IRP during the first race of the playoffs, but his talent was starting to show through.
In 2023, Hocevar was signed by Spire Motorsports to run part-time in the Xfinity Series, while still maintaining a full-time Truck Series schedule. It has been an up-and-down year for Hocevar with him getting his first win at Texas in controversial fashion. However, he also had a tough outing at Martinsville finishing 34th after being held for two laps due to rough driving.
With that being said, Hocevar nabbed two top-10s in his first three career Xfinity Series races. He finished sixth at Darlington and eighth at Charlotte.
When Corey LaJoie was announced as the replacement for Chase Elliot at Gateway, Spire Motorsports called up Hocevar to fill in. It will be Hocevar’s first career Cup Series start.
It has been an up-and-down ride for Hocevar to get here. However, he is in the Cup Series this weekend, and it will be interesting to see how he does.
Three races, three wins, and three straight celebrations with Michael Jordan. History was made at Circuit of the Americas as Tyler Reddick opened the season with an unprecedented three straight victories, holding off Shane van Gisbergen in the Texas heat while chaos and strategy shuffled the field behind them. Here’s how it scored on the Groovy Gauge, powered by Lectric eBikes.
After two wildcards to kick off the 2026 season, NASCAR headed to Circuit of the Americas (COTA) for round 3 on the year. The big headline heading into this weekend was whether or not Tyler Reddick could become the first driver in NASCAR history to win three straight races to start a campaign. Three times before, drivers have won the first two races of the year. Now Reddick, fresh off the heels of a Daytona 500 win and a win at Atlanta makes history as the only driver to go three for three.
The No. 45 23XI team is certainly on a roll with a 70-point points lead. However, not everyone had a weekend to remember. Here are the biggest losers of the 2026 NASCAR race weekend at COTA.
Another race weekend, another controversial race for Hendrick Motorsports’ Corey Day. And it is, yet again, a tangle with a JR Motorsports car that lands him on this list. Late into Saturday’s O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race at COTA, Corey Day got into his Hendrick teammate, Connor Zilisch, who was driving the No. 1 car for the team, causing Zilisch to spin out. Up to that point, Zilisch had already overcome a lot of adversity. Heading into one of the tight corners of COTA, Day clipped Zilisch, sending him around and effectively ending his contention for the race win.
After the incident, Connor Zilisch came over the radio and called Day a “total hack” and then, after the race, told reporters that he expects and deserves an apology. Day was a good sport about it all, owning up to his mistakes. But it’s just another week of Day barreling through his competitors that makes this a weekend he’d likely rather forget. To his credit, though, despite the issues, he still managed a top 5 finish. So, at least there’s that.
Unfortunately, Connor Zilisch makes the list. There was a lot of buzz around Connor Zilisch heading into the weekend, considering his dominance on road courses last year in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series. I think that many fans viewed Saturday’s race as a cakewalk for the young phenom, while others thought that the odds were in his favor to capture his first win on Sunday. Unfortunately for him, none of that came to fruition. While Saturday’s race looked like another SVG/Connor Zilisch thriller in the making, mechanical issues put the driver of the No. 1 car behind the 8-ball. Not to mention a late race incident with Corey Day and Saturday could be considered the win that could have been for Zilisch.
Sunday wasn’t much better. He did manage to keep his nose clean, so there was that. But he was more or less a non-factor most of the race. He started in the back and was able to work his way up and contend for a top 10 finish in the closing laps. Unfortunately, all he could manage was a 14th-place finish.
Undeniably, the odds-on favorite going into today’s race had to be the one, the only, the NASCAR King of the Road himself, Shane van Gisbergen. Despite win-and-you’re-in being a thing of the past, many fan still expect SVG to make the 16-driver Chase for the Cup later this year based on sheer wins at road course races alone. His first opportunity came early with COTA being the third race of the season. Unfortunately, despite winning handily in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race on Saturday, he wasn’t able to get the job done on Sunday. He was in prime position to win his seventh career cup win but, unfortunately, the stars didn’t align. He was forced to settle for a runner-up finish.
The story going into this weekend’s race at COTA was will Tyler Reddick be able to do the impossible and become the first driver in history to win the first three races of the season. It was a tall order, for sure, but the fact that he scored the pole on Saturday must have put a pep in his step. Early on, he was far from the fastest. As the race wore on, though, he got better and better, ultimately able to outduel the King of the Road, SVG on his own turf.
Because of Reddick’s dominant performance, the last loser on our list this week is the rest of the NASCAR Cup Series field. They just did not rise to the occasion, and Tyler Reddick managed to capitalize to make history. Now, they just need to go to Phoenix next week and prevent him from going four in a row. At this rate, though, Reddick might actually embarrass the field once again.
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In this post, we’re breaking down the top 10 all-time lap leaders at Circuit of the Americas, along with key stats, besides reviewing the top 15 active drivers with the most laps led at the track. And that’s not all; we’re also examining some of COTA’s historic track records and the names still holding them, so stick around until the end to check them out
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 456 | 2 | 3 | 4.0 | 2.0 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 456 | 1 | 2 | 7.3 | 9.3 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 456 | 0 | 0 | 11.0 | 13.7 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 454 | 1 | 0 | 10.5 | 10.8 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | 258 | 0 | 0 | 9.3 | 10.3 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 418 | 1 | 0 | 13.0 | 10.3 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 456 | 0 | 0 | 18.7 | 17.5 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 456 | 0 | 0 | 19.0 | 15.2 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 403 | 0 | 0 | 29.3 | 11.5 |
| Races | Laps Run | Wins | Poles | Avg. Finish | Avg. Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 456 | 0 | 0 | 13.8 | 17.5 |
Let us know your thoughts on this list. Are there any drivers that surprise you? What track record do you think will never be broken? Join the discussion on Discord or X, and remember to follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube for more updates.
