TALLADEGA, Ala. — Carson Hocevar may be only 91 races into his Cup Series career, but the journey to his first career win has been far from smooth.
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He and crew chief Luke Lambert have received so many gut punches since first joining forces at Spire Motorsports in 2024. They have just taken them in stride while never waning in the belief that they would soon celebrate a win at NASCAR's top level.
So how did they and the entire No. 77 team stay united through the mechanical failures, wrecks, and other setbacks that took them out of contention for wins?
"I just think we had so much faith in each other. It's not the human factor that we weren't winning. It's parts or little things that we could fix," Hocevar said in response to a question from FanBuzz after winning for the first time at Talladega Superspeedway.
"Everybody on our road crew is the same as before I walked in. The car that was 33rd in owners points when I was walking into it, it's all the same. The only thing that changed is crew chief, spotter, driver. We added an engineer, too.
"Like, nobody left. Nobody's left since I walked in on that car. Nobody's left since. It means a lot for me in terms of, like, I must not be hard to deal with, or too hard, that none of 'em left. But they all believe in each other."
The Hurricane struck. pic.twitter.com/CVGLJmoULs
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) April 26, 2026
The 2025 season featured so many moments when the team members could have thrown their hands up in frustration. Hocevar led laps in the Coca-Cola 600 and contended for stage wins. He put himself in a spot to potentially battle for the race win before an engine failure.
He won the pole for the first time at Texas Motor Speedway and piled up stage points before a crash dropped him to a 24th-place finish. He had mechanical failures at Dover and Daytona, and he crashed on the streets of Chicago after qualifying third.
But at no point did the team give up or look to make changes. They just kept fighting.
Carson Hocevar says that his engine failure in the Coke 600 happened because the he had been fuel saving caused the motor to spin backwards. Called it bad luck/timing.
He also said he and his spotter had a laugh about the "It 🤬 blew up" soundbyte that took off. https://t.co/Xmlg7COTFW pic.twitter.com/ZBIDF6zkdi
— Steven Taranto (@STaranto92) May 31, 2025
"We've had so much faith in each other, I don't think we've ever pointed a finger at any of us," Hocevar added.
"We've always said we can get our cars better, we can communicate better, we can go to pit practice more. It doesn't matter, we were going to take care of it."
While Hocevar is only 91 starts into his career, Lambert has enjoyed an extensive career as a crew chief in multiple series going back to 2011.
He guided Jeff Burton, Ryan Newman, and Daniel Hemric as part of Richard Childress Racing's Cup program. He celebrated a win with Newman at Phoenix Raceway in 2017.
He also worked at RFK Racing while guiding Newman and Chris Buescher. He then spent one season at Legacy Motor Club while working with multiple drivers.
"I've been in the Cup garage now for close to 20 years, not quite," Lambert said to FanBuzz. "I've taken a couple brief sabbaticals to the Xfinity Series, which were really fun. Both of the years that I spent in the Xfinity Series came with a lot of wins and a shot to win championships.
"But I want to be a Cup champion. That's my personal goal. That's what I want to do. As much fun as I had in the Xfinity Series, really enjoyed those experience, I'm grateful to Richard who gave me those opportunities originally, RCR, Dale Jr. Those were great times."
The two seasons in the Xfinity Series — now O'Reilly Auto Parts Series — with RCR and JR Motorsports featured Lambert celebrating a lot of wins.
He and Elliott Sadler won four races in 2012 and finished second in the championship standings. He and Noah Gragson won eight races and finished second in the championship standings in 2022.
The seasons in Cup did not feature this same level of success beyond that lone Newman win at Phoenix. The 2023 season, in particular, was a particularly low point.
Gragson lost his seat after 21 races due to liking an insensitive meme on Instagram. He had an average finish of 28.2 before losing his ride. The rest of the season featured John Hunter Nemechek (one race), Hocevar (eight races), Josh Berry (two races), Grant Enfinger (one race), and Mike Rockenfeller (three races) sharing the No. 42. None of them posted a top-10 finish.
Lambert and Hocevar both moved to Spire Motorsports in 2024 to take over the No. 77 team on a full-time basis. They delivered some solid runs early with six top-10 finishes and one top-five, but they didn't fully achieve consistency.
It would have been easy enough for Lambert to just shake his head and go back to the secondary NASCAR series where he knew he could win races.
He didn't do that. He had faith in Hocevar's abilities, and he had the support from Spire Motorsports owner Jeff Dickerson.
"The main thing that we tried to do from day one is set our expectations square to where we were on our journey, knowing we were on a journey that wasn't about year one, year two or year three," Lambert said. "We're into year three now. We've tried to be honest where we are in on that path.
"That's allowed us to keep putting one foot forward because we're not so focused on the feeling of defeat that you get and the crushing feeling of not getting the ultimate goal you want right now. Knowing that we're part of building something is way more rewarding.
"Since I've been at Spire Motorsports, being a small piece of that building process is truly about the most rewarding things I've ever done and the most fun in the Cup garage."
It has taken 82 races for Lambert, Hocevar, and the No. 77 team to score their first Cup Series win together. This journey was not easy, nor was it always pleasant. Yet, the path made that first win oh so much sweeter.
And now, Lambert and Hocevar are ready to taste it again.
It took the whole team. pic.twitter.com/90vxyZltoY
— Spire Motorsports (@SpireMotorsport) April 26, 2026
"I've truly enjoyed every day at Spire," Lambert said. "I wanted to be in Victory Lane sooner than now. Hope to be here a whole lot more.
"I'm thankful that we got here and I really feel like it's special to me right now because I know of all the work that so many men and women at Spire Motorsports have been putting in for years to get us to this point."
