Spire Motorsports Chevrolet driver Carson Hocevar took to the social media site formerly known Twitter on Thursday to show off his newly-painted race helmet ahead of this weekend’s Cup race in Mexico City. The 22-year-old NASCAR ace (who graduated from the same high school as me, though 16 years later) obviously has amazing taste, having committed his helmet graphic to the greatest icon of American automotive enthusiast nostalgia, the little town play rug. These imagination-sparking tiny towns with winding roads and plenty of greenspace have provided countless millions of children with playtime fun for decades. It’s difficult to say how far back the concept goes, but instructions for making your own small town play mat out of felt appeared in a 1951 issue of Ladies Home Journal.Â
— Carson Hocevar (@CarsonHocevar) June 11, 2025
Many of us with a borderline unhealthy appreciation of the automobile kicked off a lifetime of fixation by sitting criss-cross-apple-sauce on the floor making zoom zoom noises as we pushed Hot Wheels around the little winding two-lanes of our own quiet carpeted Mayberry. Hocevar’s helmet brings a lot of that nostalgia back, featuring an imaginary America where the nearby Chili’s can be reached by light rail. A good helmet is a bit like a good tattoo, in that it takes the right artist to make a vision come to fruition, but this lid design from Off Axis Paint seems to have hit the right vibe right in the bullseye. Not only does this helmet allow a great hit of nostalgia, but it allows Hocevar to incorporate his sponsors and team into the design without feeling forced. Hell yeah, this is a really good “brand integration exercise.”
Who is Carson?
Young Hocevar was named the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series Rookie of the Year, and while he hasn’t earned a victory in Cup yet, he’s got a string of top-ten finishes and earned his first pole last month. Hocevar spent most of his NASCAR career so far running in the Craftsman Truck Series, where he has five wins and an impressive 34 top ten finishes. Having earned his stripes on the myriad dirt circle tracks around Southwest Michigan, Hocevar seems to be growing into a decent NASCAR talent for a relatively small team, having been mentored through the years by the likes of Bryan Clauson and Johnny Benson. With this new helmet design, it’s clear he has some imagination and after all these years, he’s still playing with cars.Â
This weekend’s race at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez marks the first time NASCAR’s top-class Cup series has run a points-paying championship race outside the continental United States since 1958.Â
