Travis Carter, a championship-winning crew chief and NASCAR team owner, has passed away at the age of 75.
Former driver Rick Mast sparked concern on Monday with a post on social media saying that Carter was not doing well. A former NASCAR official then posted that Carter had been admitted into hospice.
Tuesday morning, multiple industry members said that the former champion had passed away. This included Brian Keselowski, Kenny Wallace, and ESPN's Ryan McGee.
"I want to send my sincere condolences to the family of Travis Carter," Hermie Sadler posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
"I rented a shop from him for a few years and we did good business together, and more importantly he did everything he said he would and then some to try and help me and my team. RIP to a good man."
Godspeed Travis Carter. He used to greet me with "Hey, Cousin McGee" because I was from Rockingham, NC and he was from Ellerbe, NC and "that's close enough." What a NASCAR legend and what a damn nice guy. pic.twitter.com/qdPg3khvG2
— Ryan McGee (@ESPNMcGee) June 10, 2025
Carter enjoyed success as a crew chief in the Cup Series while celebrating more than 30 wins. His first season was spent guiding Benny Parsons. They celebrated one win together in 1973, and they ended the season as champions.
He remained with Parsons through the 1975 season and celebrated another win. He then worked with Bobby Allison, Dave Marcis, Cale Yarborough, and Stan Barrett. Carter won his second Cup championship in 1978 while working with Yarborough.
The most successful stretch of Carter's crew chief career was in 1981-88. He was the crew chief for Harry Gant, who was recently named to the NASCAR Hall of Fame. They celebrated nine wins together and finished fourth or better in the championship standings in four seasons.
Carter closed out his tenure as a crew chief with Morgan Shepherd (five races), Rick Mast (13 races), Jimmy Spencer (34 races), and Darrell Waltrip (four races).
Carter also spent 13 years as a team owner in the Cup Series. He fielded entries for such drivers as Spencer, Mast, Hut Stricklin, Ted Musgrave, Frank Kimmel, Todd Bodine, Geoff Bodine, Hideo Fukuyama, Joe Nemecheck, Waltrip, and Butch Miller.
The team didn't celebrate any wins, but Spencer delivered a pair of runner-up finishes -- one at Talladega Superspeedway and one at Bristol Motor Speedway.