Carson Hocevar is set to return to action this weekend at Michigan International Speedway, his home track in Portage, Michigan, after missing the two most recent Craftsman Truck Series races.
Hocevar, in his third season as a full-time NASCAR Cup Series driver for Spire Motorsports, ran eight of the season's first nine Truck Series events and had intended to make nine of 10 early in the year. The team replaced him for the Charlotte Motor Speedway Truck race so he could concentrate on the Coca-Cola 600; Connor Zilisch drove the No. 77 Chevrolet at Charlotte. Zilisch also competed for Spire earlier in May at Watkins Glen International. At Nashville Superspeedway, Jesse Love filled in for Hocevar — Love had not run a Truck Series race since 2023.
Michigan International Speedway, a 2.0-mile (3.219-kilometer) oval, is the track where Hocevar grew up racing; he is from Portage, Michigan. He has made one Truck Series start at Michigan, finishing 11th there a year ago, and his better of two Cup Series finishes at the venue was 10th in 2024. Those results and his local ties frame this weekend as a return to familiar territory rather than a routine schedule slot.
Spire Motorsports fields both a full-time Cup Series effort and a full-time Truck Series team, and Hocevar is not subject to the eight-race Truck limit that applies to drivers who are not full-time Cup competitors. That flexibility has allowed the team to deploy him selectively across series this season, but it has also required the organization to name substitutes when Cup commitments overlapped with Truck dates.
What’s notable for readers tracking the No. 77 entry is what remains unresolved after Hocevar’s Michigan return: Spire Motorsports has not announced a driver for the No. 77 truck for the two races that follow this weekend. Those events are the inaugural race at the Qualcomm Circuit on Naval Base Coronado in San Diego later this month and the July race at Lime Rock Park. The team has used Connor Zilisch and Jesse Love as stand-ins in recent Truck events, but no name has been confirmed for the San Diego and Lime Rock dates.
The next concrete update to watch is the team’s announcement naming who will drive the No. 77 at Qualcomm Circuit and Lime Rock Park; that decision will determine whether Hocevar’s Michigan appearance is an isolated home-track return or the start of a short stretch of additional Truck starts. Until Spire fills the slot, the No. 77 lineup for the rest of the month and into July remains open.
