Coy Gibbs obit

 

Joe Gibbs Racing vice chairman Coy Gibbs dies at age 49

Joe Gibbs Racing vice chairman and chief operating officer Coy Gibbs – whose son, Ty, won the 2022 Xfinity Series championship on Saturday – died Sunday morning, the team confirmed.

 He was not on the list.

At about 3 p.m. ET, JGR released the following statement:

“It is with great sorrow that Joe Gibbs Racing confirms that Coy Gibbs (co-owner) went to be with the Lord in his sleep last night. The family appreciates all the thoughts and prayers and asks for privacy at this time.”

Both Coy’s father, JGR owner Joe Gibbs, and his son, Ty, returned to North Carolina prior to the start of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series championship race.

Christopher Bell, one of JGR’s Cup drivers, is one of four competing for the series title in Sunday’s race.

On Saturday night, Coy was at Phoenix Raceway as his 20-year-old son, Ty, driving for the family’s team, won his seventh race of the year and captured his first NASCAR championship.

“I’ve been through this before in multiple sports. Ty hasn’t,” Coy said after the race. “So, it was more watching him and seeing how he’s going to react during the day. I think he’s just doubled down and did his job after making a huge mistake last week.

“It was fun to watch that.”

Coy, the son of NASCAR and NFL Hall of Famer Joe Gibbs, is a former NASCAR driver and assistant coach with the NFL’s Washington Redskins.

Gibbs was a linebacker at Stanford University from 1991 to 1994. Gibbs made his NASCAR debut in the Truck Series in 2000, sharing the driving duties of the No. 18 Chevrolet with his brother, J.D., who died in 2019 from complications following a long battle with a degenerative neurological disease, also at the age of 49.

In 2001, Coy began racing fulltime in the Truck Series, posting two top-five finishes, and then finishing 10th in the series standings the following year. In 2003, he replaced Mike McLaughlin in what is now the Xfinity Series, with two top-10 finishes.

In 2004, after Joe Gibbs was re-hired as Washington’s coach, he joined the team as an Offensive Quality Control assistant, serving in that capacity until 2007.

Coy Gibbs founded the JGRMX team in 2008 and in 2016 was named to his current role of vice chairman and COO and overseeing the organization’s NASCAR programs.

Coy and his wife, Heather, have four children – Ty, Case, Jett and Elle.

Denny Hamlin tweeted Today we will do what we don’t want to do, but we we will unite as a family and race for the name on our chest.

 

Gibbs made his NASCAR debut in the Craftsman Truck Series in 2000, sharing the driving duties of the No. 18 Chevrolet with his brother J. D. In 2001, he began racing a full-time schedule, posting two top-five finishes, and finishing 10th in points both in 2001 and 2002. In 2003, he replaced Mike McLaughlin in the Busch Series, nailing down two top-ten finishes and being named runner-up in the Rookie of the Year race to David Stremme. He retired from racing at the conclusion of the season.

 

One of Gibbs’ more notable moments in NASCAR came in 2002, when he and Kevin Harvick raced in the spring Truck Series race at Martinsville Speedway. Gibbs, driving the #18 truck for his father’s team, made contact with Harvick, who was driving the #6 truck that he owned, during the race. Harvick retaliated later on by intentionally wrecking Gibbs after a restart, which resulted in the #6 being parked for the remainder of the race. Although Harvick denied his actions were intentional, radio communications proved otherwise and, since Harvick was already on probation after he got into a physical altercation with Greg Biffle after the Busch Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway two weeks earlier, the incident with Gibbs resulted in Harvick being suspended from the Cup Series race at Martinsville one day later. NASCAR determined that Harvick had violated his probation he was put on a month prior for an altercation with Greg Biffle.