Where will Chris Gabehart seemingly go next? Inside the rumors surrounding his next team after leaving JGR

The Associated Press’ Jenna Fryer on Wednesday (December 3) confirmed that Chris Gabehart has parted ways with championship-winning team Joe Gibbs Racing ahead of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season. The move comes after a shift in 2025 when he was promoted from crew chief to competition director. As of now, there’s no confirmed public announcement from Gabehart or any team about his next NASCAR career stint.

However, according to Jayski, Gabehart is rumored to be on his way to join Spire Motorsports next season. If this happened, then it would mark a big move from one of the most successful NASCAR teams to a young team, which started competing in the Cup Series in 2019.

Spire Motorsports, a team co-owned by Jeff Dickerson, has made steady progress since joining the sport, and for them hiring someone of Gabehart’s pedigree—a former championship-contending crew chief and competition director—could signal ambition to regain competitiveness and stability against the sport’s top teams.

Spire fields three full-time rides in the Cup Series. The lineup includes Michael McDowell in the #71 car, who joined the organization this past year; Carson Hocevar in the #77, who joined the team in 2024; and Daniel Suarez, who will be in his first season after spending the past five years with Trackhouse Racing. However, the crew chief of all three drivers has not been announced yet.

Even if Chris Gabehart joins Spire, we don’t know what role he will have: will he be crew chief, competition director, or something else? His past title at Joe Gibbs’ team was Competition Director, but a move to crew chief can’t be ruled out because he has vast experience leading the team.

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Take a look into Chris Gabehart's NASCAR journey at Joe Gibbs Racing

Chris Gabehart joined Joe Gibbs Racing in 2012 as a race engineer on Kyle Busch’s #18 Toyota in the Cup Series. After several years honing his engineering and technical skills, he was promoted to crew chief in JGR’s NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series program from 2016 to 2018.

During those three seasons in O’Reilly, his teams achieved 9 wins across different drivers. After that, he served as crew chief for Denny Hamlin and the #11 team from 2019 to 2024, becoming one of the more formidable crews in the series. Over those six seasons, Hamlin and Gabehart paired to collect 22 Cup Series victories and won the two Daytona 500s (2019 & 2020) and the 2021 Southern 500. They made the Championship 4 appearance for three straight years from 2019 to 2021.

Over his 209 Cup Series races as crew chief, Chris Gabehart’s record included 11 poles, 90 top-5 finishes, and 120 top-10 finishes.