TC Daily Pit Stop: Joe Gibbs Racing Hires Championship-Winning Car Chief for Ty Gibbs

TC Daily Pit Stop: Thursday, April 3rd, 2025

Apr 03, 2025

Ty Gibbs gets a new Car Chief Robert "Cheddar" Smith heading into this weekend's Goodyear 400 at Darlington — Photo Credit: David Rosenblum, LAT Images for Toyota GAZOO Racing

Through seven races, it’s been a rough start to the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season for Ty Gibbs and the No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing team. While JGR has collected four wins through the opening seven races, and the other three drivers are in Playoff contention, Gibbs has just one top-15 finish and sits 31st in the championship standings.

After the rocky start, Joe Gibbs Racing has made a personnel move heading into this weekend’s Goodyear 400 at Darlington Raceway with hopes of turning the season around. Robert “Cheddar” Smith, who won a NASCAR Cup Series championship in 2014 with Stewart-Haas Racing as the car chief for Kevin Harvick, has been hired in the same role for Gibbs.

Chris Gabehart confirmed the move in an interview with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio on Wednesday.

Prior to this week, Smith had been serving as the Car Chief for Justin Haley and the No. 7 Spire Motorsports team. Smith followed his longtime crew chief Rodney Childers to the Spire team, but parted ways with the organization and moved to JGR this week.

Chastain ‘Confused’ by Logano’s Post-Race Martinsville Criticisms

Toby Christie — Photo Credit: Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images

Ross Chastain finished sixth in last Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series Cook Out 400 at Martinsville Speedway, and while he was happy with his race, but slightly disappointed in missing out on a top-five finish, he became even more disappointed in hearing what Joey Logano had to say about him in interviews on pit road following the race.

Logano told the press that Chastain, Races like a jackass every week, and I keep paying the price, and I'm sick of paying the price."

Comments that Chastain admitted in a Media Availability on Wednesday confused him.

"I am confused by what he said," Chastain explained.

Logano was upset by a pair of blocks that Chastain made at Martinsville, but Chastain didn’t feel the blocks were egregious, and that Logano’s public comments were uncalled for.

"I mean, he's a three-time champ, he can say what he wants, but those words have a lot of weight,” Chastain said. “And to just get out and spew that, call me those names, is not appreciated. Not warranted, I don't think. And honestly, pretty disappointing that he would do that."