{"id":941399,"date":"2026-10-21T23:52:22","date_gmt":"2026-10-21T23:52:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/941399\/"},"modified":"2026-10-21T23:52:22","modified_gmt":"2026-10-21T23:52:22","slug":"nascar-trade-secret-lawsuit-escalates-as-jgr-seeks-150-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/941399\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR Trade-Secret Lawsuit Escalates as JGR Seeks $150 Million"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joe Gibbs Racing is now seeking nearly $150 million in damages in a federal lawsuit that Spire Motorsports contends has morphed from a fact-driven case into a battle of experts.<\/p>\n

In a new document filed in US District Court in Charlotte, North Carolina, Spire claims JGR is \u201cpoised to launch a new round of expert reports and discovery over whether the 99 race car setups Spire has used for its three Chevrolets in 2026 somehow reflect misappropriated \u2018setup philosophies\u2019 from hundreds of JGR\u2019s 2025 Toyota setups.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spire contends JGR has no evidence that its former competition director Chris Gabehart possessed those setups when he began working for Spire in 2026.<\/p>\n

JGR initially filed the federal lawsuit against Gabehart in February and then added Spire Motorsports in May due that organization\u2019s success in the season\u2019s first 11 races.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust four days ago\u2014after the close of fact discovery and only after the Court ordered it\u2014JGR finally produced a final list of its allegedly misappropriated trade secrets, on top of over 13,000 other documents it previously withheld,\u201d stated the document, which was filed Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\"NASCAR<\/p>\n

Meg Oliphant\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Spire claims JGR has sought its trade secrets, including race car setups, \u201cdespite no evidence the setups were transmitted to Spire, while refusing to produce its own setups, which Spire, of course, needs to defend against JGR\u2019s meritless allegations of setup misappropriation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cJGR\u2019s experts now intend to scour Spire\u2019s setups for the 2025 and 2026 Cup Series seasons\u2014none of which match any JGR setup\u2014and opine that they reflect as-yet-unexplained JGR \u2018setup philosophies,\u2019\u201d Spire contends. \u201cEvery race, JGR creates unique setups for each of its four cars and the three cars it builds for 23XI, and Spire creates unique setups for each of its three cars. With 71 races completed in the 2025 and 2026 seasons, the parties and their experts will be analyzing more than 600 setups\u2014each containing hundreds of distinct parameters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spire also claims JGR withheld essential documents, including contracts with Toyota Racing Development, then \u201cdumped over 13,000 documents on Spire\u201d in response to the court\u2019s October 7 order. Spire says it has already provided its contracts with Chevrolet and Hendrick Motorsports to JGR.<\/p>\n

Spire maintains JGR has insufficient evidence to show that Spire misappropriated anything that belonged to JGR, including its \u201ccrown jewels.\u201d It also states in the document that JGR\u2019s damages expert has stated that JGR\u2019s damages are $47.4 million, not the nearly $150 million it is seeking.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Court should not permit this trial by ambush,\u201d the document states.<\/p>\n

In the document, Spire voices its opposition to JGR\u2019s second motion to alter the case schedule and for protection. It claims JGR refuses to make its experts available for deposition on the court\u2019s previously ordered schedule and seeks modifications that would give:<\/p>\n

Spire five business days to respond to JGR\u2019s new expert reports, which it contends will be the case\u2019s primary focus.The parties five business days to prepare for and depose 12 experts\u2014nine retained, four non-retained\u2014located around the country.
\nSpire one day to prepare its summary judgment and file its legal argument in opposition to expert witnesses.
\nSpire six business days during Thanksgiving to respond to JGR\u2019s summary judgment and motions opposing specific expert witnesses.
\nSpire three days to file replies.<\/p>\n

Spire maintains the deadlines, which were \u201calready extremely compressed at JGR\u2019s insistence\u201d are now \u201cimpossible and prejudicial.\u201d<\/p>\n

The trial is scheduled to begin February 1, 2027.\n<\/p>\n

\"Lettermark\"<\/p>\n

A North Carolina native, Deb Williams is an award-winning motorsports journalist who is in her fourth decade covering auto racing. In addition to covering the sport for United Press International, she has written motorsports articles for several newspapers, magazines and websites including espnW.com<\/a>, USA Today, and The Charlotte Observer. Her awards include the American Motorsports Media Award of Excellence, two-time National Motorsports Press Association writer of the year, and two-time recipient of the Russ Catlin award. She also has won an award in the North Carolina Press Association\u2019s sports feature category.\u00a0 During her career, Deb has been managing editor of GT Motorsports magazine and was with Winston Cup Scene and NASCAR Winston Cup Scene for 18 years, serving as the publication\u2019s editor for 10 years. In 2024 she was inducted into the NMPA Hall of Fame.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joe Gibbs Racing is now seeking nearly $150 million in damages in a federal lawsuit that Spire Motorsports…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":941400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,782,322429,784,237154,1642,634,322428,273948,82,183339],"class_list":["post-941399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-content-type-news","tag-contentid-35a6ef9e-2bda-46a9-aaad-5f4f70e45272","tag-displaytype-standard-article","tag-issyndicated-false","tag-locale-us","tag-nascar","tag-shorttitle-jgr-now-seeks-nearly-150-million-in-spire-lawsuit","tag-sponsored-false","tag-sports","tag-subsection-nascar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=941399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/941400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=941399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=941399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=941399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}