(Photo: Travis Haston | The Podium Finish)
MADISON, Ill. — Three years ago, Corey LaJoie wrote Rick Hendrick a letter explaining why he deserves an opportunity with his race team.
That letter never led to anything. Hendrick hired Kyle Larson instead.
Fast forward to June 2023 and those hopes for LaJoie have been fulfilled under unique circumstances. He’ll drive the No. 9 NAPA Chevrolet at WWT Technology Raceway on Sunday for Chase Elliott, who was suspended for a race after crashing Denny Hamlin last week.
With Josh Berry, the team’s alternate driver who has made nine starts this season, in Portland, Oregon for the NASCAR Xfinity Series race, HMS turned to the veteran LaJoie.
“It’s been six years of grind and stacking pennies to feel confident enough to be able to plug into this No. 9 Chevy and run it to its true potential,” LaJoie said in a press conference Saturday. “The opportunity to drive for Mr. Hendrick, it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity.”
LaJoie is off to a career-best start with Spire Motorsports this season behind the wheel of the No. 7 car. He has an average finish of 19.5, which is five spots better than last season, and is 19th in driver’s points.
On Tuesday, LaJoie received a text message from Jeff Dickerson, the co-owner of Spire, explaining that’d he drive the No. 9 car if Elliott were to get suspended. Later that day while at NASCAR to record his podcast, LaJoie got the official word.
LaJoie, however, missed the call from team owner Rick Hendrick and called him back Wednesday morning to officially accept the offer.
“It’s like the dream is during the day right now. I missed the call from Mr. Hendrick – he left me a voicemail. I woke up to it on Wednesday morning and I told my wife, I was like – honey, I missed the call,” LaJoie said. “Luckily he answered when I called him back on Wednesday morning and since then, it’s been like drinking out of a fire hose. Just information, preparation and just a level of perfection that those guys expect is really cool to see for the first three or four days leading up to here at St. Louis.
“You go to the shop and you walk in there for the first five minutes and you realize just the collective focus of that group. Their goal is to win races and championships. You can walk through the lobby and you can tell why they’re so successful after the more time I spent there. I got there around 7:15 a.m. Wednesday. I spent about an hour and a half with Alan (Gustafson) and his engineers and walked through the shop. Around 8:30 a.m., we went to the simulators and spent some time there.
“I left with much more confidence Wednesday of seeing the process and just the system that those guys have – that you can plugin somebody with good talent and that’s how they become great in the process with those tools and resources. Those guys build champions for a reason because they can extract the very best.”
Twenty-year-old Carson Hocevar will drive in LaJoie’s place at Spire and make his Cup Series debut. He has four consecutive top fives in the Craftsman Truck Series and a pair of top 10s in the Spire Xfinity Series car. 
(Photo: Travis Haston | The Podium Finish)Outside of LaJoie’s letter to Hendrick in 2020, the opportunity is a full-circle moment for his entire family. In 1998, LaJoie’s father, Randy, filled in for Ricky Craven at HMS for nine races.
But even since that letter, Corey said that he’s matured both on and off the track. If he got that opportunity to drive for the team then, he said that he wouldn’t have been prepared.
“I wouldn’t have been ready for the opportunity – my maturation level, my skills behind the wheel,” LaJoie said. “The last six or eight months, maybe a little less than that, have been like me preparing for today just not knowing if it’d ever come. It would just be like getting rid of those small defeats of – if you’re going to wake up at 5:30 a.m., you’re going to wake up at 5:30 a.m. If you’re going to work out at 7:00 a.m., you’re getting there at 6:50 a.m. Leaning into the work and just not making excuses or exceptions to the pursuit of the person that you want to be. Not the person that you are, but the person you’re striving to be.
“And then you go to Hendrick (Motorsports) and you see that there’s 500 people over there that have the same mentality, and it’s like – OK, that’s why they’re so freaking good.”
After Sunday’s Enjoy Illinois 300, LaJoie will head back to Spire, a team that has an affiliation with HMS. Spire uses the same motors and pit crews as the 14-time Cup Series champions.
LaJoie hopes that his opportunity with Hendrick can help improve Spire when he heads back to the shop Monday morning.
LaJoie with crew chief Alan Gustafson (Photo: Bobby Krug | The Podium Finish)
“I’ve been here three days and my philosophy of how I approach a weekend; how I prepare, how I’m going to engage with my team at Spire Motorsports going forward is going to change,” LaJoie explained. “I think I’m going to be able to come in there and just apply and share some of the things I’ve learned over the course of the week with (Ryan) Sparks and the No. 77 team, as well, and I think we’re all going to be stronger for it.”
Though he’s just a substitute for Elliott, Sunday’s race still has massive implications for LaJoie. Should he win, he’ll be in a position to make the Cup Series playoffs.
But his mindset doesn’t change.
“Once you put the helmet on – the talking and all the things that come along with that, all the interviews, that’s the noise,” LaJoie said. “But the noise stops whenever you put the helmet on and you just drive it no different that I would the No. 7 car.”
Sunday’s race is set for 3:30 p.m. ET on FS1. LaJoie will start 30th.
