A court ruling on April 23 granted Joe Gibbs Racing partial relief in its legal battle against Chris Gabehart. The decision restricts Gabehart from director-level duties at Spire Motorsports but allows him trackside access.

Reporting about the judge's decision on the preliminary injunction, Bob Pockrass tweeted on X, saying, "Not much different than temporary restraining order, and most provisions Gabehart already had agreed to. She was more specific that it's OK he's at the track. No action against Spire."

Earlier, the court had put a temporary restraining order on Chris Gabehart, restricting him from performing the same roles for Spire that he did for Joe Gibbs Racing last year till November, when he was let go as the competition director. 

After the race in Bristol, JGR’s current competition director, Wally Brown, filed a motion stating that Gabehart violated the temporary restraining order. Brown submitted multiple pictures of Gabehart, trackside, while wearing a radio headset as well as speaking to Carson Hocevar.

But now, according to the most recent hearing, the court provided partial relief to JGR, making it clear that, according to section 6 of his JGR contract, the non-compete clause means Gabehart will not be allowed to perform any competition director-level duties for Spire.

While one of the most important facets of this case is JGR’s accusations that Gabehart took confidential information and leaked it to Spire, the court cleared Spire because no evidence was found that Spire had the information, nor was there any illegal conduct on their part in hiring Gabehart from JGR.

Conclusions From the Preliminary Injunction Favor JGR

The court granted and denied certain parts of JGR’s motions, but JGR will feel they have the upper hand now with the court asking Gabehart to “immediately cease and desist from retaining, transferring, using or copying any of JGR’s Confidential Information and trade secrets."

Not just that, Gabehart has also been told to return any of the Confidential Information he has in his possession to JGR. The court also provided an elongated version of the temporary restraining order. 

It specified that Gabehart shall be restricted from violating Section 6 of his Employment Agreement with JGR, which states an 18-month non-compete, meaning that under no circumstances is Gabehart allowed to provide the same services he did for JGR.

This came despite Gabehart arguing that it was initially JGR that violated Section 6 by withholding payments. The court clarifies that Gabehart isn’t required to resign from Spire, and he can continue in his new role.

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Written by

Debrup Chaudhuri

Edited by

Suyashdeep Sason