Carson Hocevar was hoping to recapture some momentum after falling in the Chase standings at Iowa. At Richmond, instead, Hocevar fell even further.
And worst of all for him and his legion of fans, a catastrophic mechanical failure was self-inflicted.
Hocevar and team struggled throughout the night with handling issues. He was frequently relaying to his crew chief, Luke Lambert, about the No. 77 car’s inability to turn.
And that was on top of pace issues that have plagued all Chevy teams since the introduction of the new Camaro body to start the season.
After a green-flag pit stop in Stage 3, Hocevar blended back into the field in P32. And that’s when things went from bad to worse than worst.
‘I just money shifted it’
As he was accelerating into fifth gear, Hocevar shifted into third gear instead, grenading the motor. Car done. Night over on Lap 285 of the Cook Out 400.
“I just money shifted it,” said Hocevar. “F*ck me. Blown up. Sorry.”
A money shift sounds like a good thing. It’s the opposite. It’s a shift that will cost a car owner, personal or otherwise, a lot of money to fix.
This was a more common error with the older generation of cars that featured an H-pattern. In 2022, with the sequential shifter, it has been less frequent.
As you can see on Hocevar’s in-car cam, the downshift, instead of going to fifth under heavy acceleration, caused the RPMs to spike at over 10,100.
Hocevar tumbles again in the Chase standings
After the Brickyard 400, Hocevar has risen to fifth in the Chase standings. A P31 finish in the Iowa Corn 350 dropped him to eighth in the standings.
Ahead of Richmond, Hocevar was looking for a rebound. Instead, his mistake led to a last-place finish, P37 to be exact. And another drop in the Chase standings. He now sits in 11th in points.
While Hocevar isn’t in danger of falling out of the Chase with two races remaining, falling six places in two races is the absolute antithesis of what he and his team were hoping.
Although he has not technically clinched a spot, Hocevar sits 128 points above the cutline. Still, he needs to finish strong over the next two weeks to be a factor in NASCAR’s postseason.
The final two-race stretch before the Chase resumes next week when the series heads to Loudon, New Hampshire, and then finishes at Daytona six days later.
What’s up next on the NASCAR Cup Series Schedule
On Sunday, August 23rd, NASCAR makes its return to New Hampshire Motor Speedway for the Dollar Tree 301. This will be the third race on USA Sports, which will carry NASCAR coverage through the end of the season.
The race begins at 3:00 p.m. ET. It will be televised on USA Network.
Last year’s race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway offered a first. Ryan Blaney notched his first win at Loudon and had to hold off a furious charge by Josh Berry to score it.
It was a Penske-dominated day. Blaney and teammate Joey Logano led 263 of 301 laps in the race. Josh Berry, for all intents and purposes in the fourth Penske driver, led another 10 laps. All three of those drivers are hoping for repeat performances this year.
