The legal dispute between Joe Gibbs Racing and Chris Gabehart/Spire Motorsports takes a new turn every month. On September 30, Matt Weaver posted the text messages that Spire Motorsports produced in court as ‌part of discovery, claiming that there’s ‘palpable hatred’ of JGR leadership against their former competition director, Gabehart. It sounds serious at first glance, but after uncovering the details, this ordeal turned out to be funny, which was pointed out by Jeff Gluck. 

“Aside from the legal context here, taking your dogs for a walk so they can pee on your enemy’s car is at least somewhat funny though,” Gluck wrote on X. The text messages, produced by Spire, were from JGR co-owner Heather Gibbs. And the statement from the court filings stated: “Also what car does Gabehart drive I might take my dogs on a drive some nights.”

The text didn’t explicitly state Gibbs’ intention, but Gluck inferred the context from the message. But this isn’t funny to everyone, particularly JGR’s veteran driver Denny Hamlin. “Only facts about the actual case matter. Have we not learned that yet?”

This was Hamlin’s direct jab at Spire, as JGR is seeking civil contempt against Spire and Gabehart on the grounds that they violated the court’s restraining order and the preliminary injunction placed against them in March. Under this order, Gabehart wasn’t allowed to perform his duties as the competition director. JGR even produced documents and a deposition of text messages indicating that Gabehart was acting in a similar role. 

This included a conversation between Gabehart and Carson Hocevar. But in response, Spire Motorsports argued that JGR has failed to provide evidence that Gabehart transmitted the files JGR claims he took to Spire. “There is no such evidence, because that did not happen,” the text documents provided by Spire stated. It is worth noting that this legal dispute is still in the discovery phase before both parties get involved in a trial scheduled on Feb 1, 2027. 

A total of five motions were heard in the Western District of North Carolina this week, according to Bob Pockrass. And the decision is likely to come by Monday. “Court done for the day. Decisions will come Monday. One of the motions covers metadata that could tell when Gabehart accessed any of the JGR info he had in his possession. One focused on getting final list of trade secrets alleged in the case,” Pockrass posted on X. But Hamlin couldn’t help but ask a witty question of the veteran reporter. 

“Bob, I thought he gave all of the information he had on his devices back last winter. Is that not the case?” Pockrass’ report stated JGR’s allegation against Gabehart, claiming that he had access to JGR info until June on a different device. So Hamlin was curious as well as sarcastic in his reply to Bob’s tweet. This goes onto show how heated things are between the two camps. Interestingly, Hamlin and Gabehart worked together in a driver/crew chief pairing for 6 seasons (2019 to 2024). 

Hendrick Motorsports also had to get involved in this legal tussle to safeguard their trade secrets and interests. As part of the discovery process, JGR wanted information on Spire Motorsports’ setups to confirm their allegations. But Spire has a technical alliance with Hendrick Motorsports, and revealing such information to a direct OEM rival would put them at risk. But JGR and HMS have found common ground. 

JGR has withdrawn efforts to ‌get any communications from Hendrick Motorsports that would include references to its most protected proprietary information. They will stay away from acquiring details that risk Hendrick’s most proprietary competition information. The decision by the court on Monday will be much awaited as it will bring new details and twists to this ongoing legal dispute between JGR and Spire Motorsports. After last year’s NASCourt session between NASCAR and 23XI Racing, this off-season could see a similar trend.