While the 36 drivers battle it out for the championship, there is a new war going on between two of them in the shadows. Carson Hocevar vs. Chase Elliott: Who is going to be the winner of the Most Popular Driver Award? On one side, we have the eight-time winner Elliott, and on the other side, we have the underdog Hocevar. And for the time being, the scales are tipping slightly in Hocevar’s favor.

During a recent interview with the media before the NASCAR All-Star Race, Carson Hocevar provided a major update about his online presence. And it is safe to say that the numbers are looking good on his social media right now. As Hocevar admitted:

“Yeah, I have; I think I average a few hundred more viewers. Every post is up, you know, like the truck wins alone. Like on Instagram, I almost got like a million interactions and whatever. But I’ve seen like definitely an uptick for sure in all platforms, really.”

Just like any other driver, Carson Hocevar is active on social media. He is especially a part of the online streaming culture as a young driver. Carson Hocevar is a regular streamer on Twitch with nearly 41,000 followers watching him race online on iRacing or just enjoying a casual time.

Hocevar’s recent post about his Truck series victory garnered 66,000 likes on Instagram. Comparing it directly to his pre-Talladega posts, it has almost double the interactions. For example, his post from Bristol Motor Speedway has only 24,000 likes. It is a direct consequence of his victory at Talladega, which ultimately led to a surge in his popularity.

The 23-year-old also earned himself the “Hurricane” nickname.

After the win, as he rolled past the packed grandstand, soaking in the roar of the crowd, Hocevar decided to take the celebration one step further. He drove the car down to the apron and perched his 6-foot-4 frame on the edge of the driver-side window. In one motion, he ripped off the steering wheel, worked the clutch, snapped the wheel back on, and carefully guided the No. 77 Chevrolet down the frontstretch, all while giving fans an unobstructed, helmet-off view of their newest Talladega winner. The reaction from the stands was electric, fittingly.

For Hocevar, this means good news. After all, he is going up against Chase Elliott‘s popularity. Elliott has won the MPD award eight times in a row for the past seasons. In fact, among drivers whose names are dominating Google right now, Elliott stands second, with Hocevar at tenth.

So Hocevar will need to use every little interaction boost he can get. But it is not just in numbers. As Hocevar revealed, people are slowly starting to connect to him on a deeper level and show up more.

“So, pretty much if I weren’t racing, the viewers would drop a lot. But now I can; I could just sit there with my webcam on and, you know, yap about food or whatever I want to talk about…” Hocevar further said during his interview. “I kind of use a collective ‘we’ because, like, a lot of my friends do content creation and everything, and you know, we enjoy when the numbers are higher, obviously.

“But honestly, we’re just realizing that it’s not going to really drop, and the more fun we have, the more we tend to see it go up. So, yeah, it just makes us all excited for when I can start doing stuff away from my desk and everything. You know, I think that’s how you grow everything nowadays.”

There have also been debates all over social media about whether Cleetus McFarland’s influence could help Hocevar in toppling Elliott’s crown. McFarland has a huge fan base with over 4.5 million subscribers and shares a good bond with Hocevar.

Even Dale Earnhardt Jr. has welcomed the possibility in Hocevar’s favor, saying, “I believe there will be years where Chase has some real competition, and honestly, I feel like that’s already happening. I’d love to know how close that battle really is.”

Further backing up his argument, Junior added how even he would have been hesitant to go to the Met Gala.

“Even going to the Met Gala — that’s not a place where I would feel comfortable, but he got the call and said, ‘Hell, I’ll do that. Yeah, why not? I did not expect to see him there,” Jr. said after Hocevar traded his racing suit for a Dior tuxedo to mark his appearance at the Met Gala, becoming the first NASCAR driver to attend the exclusive event since Jeff Gordon in 2010.

And now, with hints emerging that Hocevar might soon have his open-wheel dream, his popularity is bound to shoot up.

With a little help

Recently, Carson Hocevar visited the Indianapolis Motor Speedway during the practice for the Indy 500. And when asked about attempting ‘The Double’ with Spire Motorsports, Hocevar was clear about his goals – “I wouldn’t say no”

Now, even Spire co-owner Jeff Dickerson has hinted at the same, saying, “Carson wants to be here like in a car like tomorrow. So, we’ll figure that out.”

That won’t be too hard, considering that TWG owns both Spire and Andretti Global.

That said, Hocevar would require a little help from Cassidy Towriss, wife of Dan Towriss – TWG CEO. As Hocevar admitted, ” “Well I was just down there. Realistically I just need to convince (his wife) Cassidy and then she’ll convince Dan. I was with Cass.”

Still, once that plan succeeds, Hocevar would have to find a way to be comfortable inside open-wheel cars, thanks to his 6-foot-4 frame. But what can be said certainty is that whenever he does walk to sit inside one of those, his popularity will further shoot up.