Carson Hocevar responds to Denny Hamlin calling him an 'idiot'

Carson Hocevar is a race fan through and through. He listens to the various NASCAR shows and podcasts, which means he hears the criticism of his driving style.

This week, he heard plenty of it for what he did to Christopher Bell at Atlanta. Denny Hamlin notably offered a scathing review of Hocevar’s judgment inside the race car: “I keep hearing, ‘Well, he’s going for it. So, if I’m three car lengths behind Carson Hocevar, and I go through the grass into Turn 1, is that just me going for it, or is that me being an idiot? I think we have to stop using the, ‘He’s just going for it.'”

Hocevar on Thursday made an appearance on the “Gluckcast” with Jeff Gluck of The Athletic. The Spire Motorsports driver gave his official response to what Hamlin had to say.

“I mean, I see it just because I’m a race fan,” Hocevar told Gluck. “I watch all the shows and listen in, but I’m not out there driving and going, ‘Ah, I wanna sell some more t-shirts. I’m gonna split this hole, or I’m gonna make this move and, yeah, they’ll talk about that in the interview, ah, did you see that? Did you see what I did and cut a WWE promo.’

“I don’t know, I’m just racing. I’m out there, I see opportunities and this is all I think about. This is what I do. The rest is noise, and I laugh at it sometimes, or I see it but there’s not one bit where I look at any podcast or anything — I just look at it and go, ‘That’s just entertainment.’ The rest is all competition, and I separate it.”

Carson Hocevar has heard it all coming out of Atlanta

The move in question at Atlanta came during the first overtime restart, in which Bell started on the outside of the front row. Bell didn’t even make it to Turn 1 before his No. 20 Toyota went crashing into the outside wall. Hocevar, running behind Bell off the restart, saw a hole between Bell and race-leader Bubba Wallace and tried to fill it. Hocevar forced the issue and it ended Bell’s bid at winning his first race of the season. Hocevar, meanwhile, finished fourth.

The on-track incidents continue to pile up, and the criticism of the 23-year-old’s driving style only gets louder. Hocevar seems to be just fine with that.

“I think we all just race,” Hocevar said Tuesday on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “I think everyone races me very aggressively at times, and I feel like I do the same. Obviously, I’m probably a little bit more on the take side, but I think Bowman Gray and Daytona and Atlanta, I feel like it was very calculated in what I wanted to do.”