Joe Gibbs Racing v. Chris Gabehart

Joe Gibbs Racing v. Chris Gabehart & Spire Motorsports is a pending case in which Joe Gibbs Racing alleges Chris Gabehart stole confidential team information before departing the organization and accepting a leadership role with Spire Motorsports.

Chris Gabehart was a former competition director and crew chief of Joe Gibbs Racing and requested a bigger and broader role from JGR. Joe Gibbs, the owner of JGR, declined Gabehart's request and Gabehart left the company on November 10. Gabehart returned his JGR work computer and phone. JGR claims that Gabehart photographed sensitive data from his company laptop, and synced proprietary files to a personal Google Drive folder labeled “Spire,” which retained confidential team information.

On February 9, Gabehart was terminated from JGR.^[1] On February 19, 2026, two months and nine days after Gabehart left, it was announced that JGR filed a lawsuit against Gabehart regarding the information and leadership role and seeking damages of at least US$8 million.^[2][3] On February 21, 2026, Spire Motorsports confirmed Gabehart was hired as their Chief Motorsports Officer.^[4] Three days later, JGR filed an amended complaint which added Spire as a defendant^[5][6] and sought a temporary restraining order preventing Gabehart from working in a comparable competition role for Spire during the noncompete period, as well as barring both defendants from using or retaining confidential team information.^[7][8]

Later on the same day, Gabehart formally opposed the temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction and released his statement claiming that JGR was using the lawsuit to punish a former employee for daring to leave rather than protecting trade secrets, and denying that confidential team information was transmitted, distributed, or used.^[9][10][11] Gabehart also claimed that JGR had a dysfunctional organizational structure, claims he expressed “serious concerns” about how the No. 54 team was managed and how he was pressured by JGR to become a crew chief to Ty Gibbs back in June.^[9][12] On February 27, a hearing for the temporary restraining order request was held, and the court delayed the decision on the restraining order until March 2 to allow both parties to work on a resolution, which ended up not happening.^[13] On March 2, the courts granted JGR the temporary restraining order against Gabehart, which prevented Gabehart from performing duties similar to a competition director at Spire, mandated the return of all JGR data, and put a US$100,000 bond in place.^[14][15] The request for the temporary restraining order against Spire was denied.^[14][15]

On March 1, JGR filed a motion for discovery against Spire and Gabehart, claiming that Spire encouraged Gabehart to acquire confidential team information as part of a job change.^[16] On that same day Spire filed a declaration that shows Gabehart signed an agreement to not disclose JGR's confidential team information.^[16] On March 7, JGR filed an argument alongside declarations from multiple JGR employees, JGR driver Denny Hamlin, Toyota's Andy Graves, and Front Row Motorsports owner Bob Jenkins in support of expedited fact discovery.^[17] Alongside the arguments and multiple declarations, it was also revealed that JGR hired a private investigator that showed Spire owner Jeff Dickerson and Gabehart driving to and from a restaurant and sitting at the same table.^[17][18] JGR also claims that Spire was trying to poach their sponsors, SAIA and Zep.^[17]

On March 11, Spire and Gabehart addressed the declarations. Gabehart stated that Spire already had three crew chiefs and a competition director, and that his new job as Chief Motorsports Officer had no overlap with those two things.^[19][20] Gabehart also stated that Spire was more expansive, competing in more series than JGR and additionally with Spire's holding company TWG Motorsports adding even more motorsports to the umbrella.^[19][20] Dickerson filed his own declaration stating that he was surprised and disturbed to learn that JGR hired a private investigator to follow Gabehart around. He also stated that nobody from JGR informed Spire or Himself that Gabehart was applicable non-compete until the lawsuit.^[19][21] Dickerson also claims that they didn't want JGR's confidential team information, and it was useless due to engineering changing on a day-to-day and week-by-week basis.^[21]

On March 16, the preliminary injunction hearing was delayed again, and the courts granted both parties' motions of discovery.^[22][23] Also, JGR told the court that Gabehart, prior to meeting with Dickerson, had opened a JGR-owned file named "Project Howler" twice.^[23]