NASCAR driver Carson Hocevar fined $50K for derogatory remark about Mexico City

NASCAR driver Carson Hocevar doesn’t appear to be a fan of Mexico City. His team fined him $50,000 on Tuesday and ordered him to undergo sensitivity training after the 22-year-old called the Mexican capital a “s—-hole” during a recent livestream.

Hocevar’s remark came as he played video games on the Twitch broadcasting platform ahead of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race in the Mexican capital. Hocevar finished 34th but wasn’t thrilled about the trip during the lead-up to the event.

“If the travel was better, if getting here was easier, if you felt safer getting to and from everywhere, if it wasn’t such a s—-hole, if the track limits were a little better enforced, if it was going to be a little bit better of a race and it wasn’t so easy to feel so locked down like you can’t leave anywhere, it’d be a great experience,” he said.

The comment spread after the race, leading to a swift punishment from his team, Spire Motorsports.

“Carson Hocevar’s recent comments during that livestream fell short of [our] standard,” the team said in a statement. “They did not represent the views of Spire Motorsports, our partners, or NASCAR.”

Spire will donate the fine’s funds to a handful of Mexican charities, including the nation’s Red Cross and United Way. The driver will also complete “cultural sensitivity and bias-awareness training.”

Hocevar later posted on social media, “Maybe a kid that had never been out of the country until Thursday should never give an opinion about what any place is like other than Portage, Michigan. … Now that I’ve actually left my hotel a couple times and raced here in front of some of the most passionate fans I’ve ever seen, my opinion has changed.”