Not that long ago, Denny Hamlin was skeptical of Joe Gibbs’ decision. At the end of the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series season, Gibbs decided to shuffle the No. 11 Toyota team. Hamlin’s former colleague, Chris Gabehart, who had collaborated with him for 22 wins over six years, was reassigned to a different role. But a little over a year later, however, Hamlin’s views have flipped with the shocking JGR lawsuit.

Denny Hamlin feels crestfallen at the JGR lawsuit

“It’s awfully disappointing to see two people that you’ve cared for not at odds right now. But I can only listen. If Joe Gibbs Racing is willing to go to court, I think they’re pretty serious. I’ll say that Joe [Gibbs] ain’t looking to fight anyone. So, it’s tough,” Denny Hamlin said on ‘Actions Detrimental.’

Two months after Denny Hamlin’s team, 23XI Racing, settled the NASCAR lawsuit, another legal battle unfolded in the sport. Last Thursday, Joe Gibbs Racing filed an $8 million lawsuit in the Western District of North Carolina. The JGR lawsuit accused former competition director Chris Gabehart of sharing confidential information and trade secrets with a competing team. And Hamlin, despite the good times shared with Gabehart, had to pick JGR’s side.

“No one person owns any information,” Denny Hamlin said. “I collaborated in that I put my time in to help develop that. The engineers put time into developing that. In the aero department, there are so many departments that contribute to whatever that piece of paper says that the car is running that weekend. No one person owns that or has the right to take it anywhere. That’s someone else’s work. And so that’s why, as race teams, we have to protect that because we race a spec car now.”

“I mean, do you know how much faster we could possibly be if we had all of Hendrick’s information, theirs and ours? You just can’t let that happen. Which is why the teams are so very protective of their information. It’s what separates us is what our employees come up with during those weeks.

Denny Hamlin continued on the JGR lawsuit, “And you know, I’m sure Joe Gibbs Racing has spent tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars over the last decades coming up with what they think is the right answer every weekend. And they deserve to protect that.”

The JGR lawsuit has shaken up the past camaraderie within JGR. While Denny Hamlin and Joe Gibbs are parting ways with Chris Gabehart, the latter is forming new ties.

Welcoming the talent into a new fold

Despite Joe Gibbs and Denny Hamlin’s claims, Chris Gabehart has denied the legal allegations. He is also gearing up for a legal response in the JGR lawsuit. While he is going about it, Spire Motorsports made things official. It hired Gabehart to serve as Chief Motorsports Officer, a role that will oversee multiple disciplines.

This hire has served as the basis for the JGR lawsuit. Joe Gibbs has accused Chris Gabehart of accessing proprietary information while negotiating with Spire while syncing that data to his personal devices. Even amidst such grave accusations, current Spire driver Daniel Suarez put in a good word for Gabehart.

“He’s extremely smart and extremely competitive,” Suarez said. “I have nothing but respect for him.”

He continued about the 2016 Xfinity Series championship run: “Obviously, you know, I never really got to work with him… only one race, actually, in 2017. I have nothing but respect for him. He was extremely fast in 2016. He was the biggest threat for us to win the championship with Erik Jones. So, I have nothing but respect for everything that he has done in his career.”

With two clearly defined legal sides in the sport, let’s wait and see how the JGR lawsuit unfolds.