Wheeler was born in Belmont, North Carolina. His father was the athletic director and football coach at Belmont Abbey College, and Wheeler absorbed an early sense of showmanship watching his father manage crowds and events. He attended Charlotte Catholic High School, where he excelled at boxing and debate. At the age of 13, he founded the town's only bicycle repair shop and began promoting weekly bicycle races — an early sign of his entrepreneurial instincts.
Wheeler pursued a boxing career with genuine seriousness, compiling a 40–2 amateur record before deciding the likely opponents in his weight class — including Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali — made the sport too perilous. He pivoted to football, accepting a scholarship to the University of South Carolina, but a severe back injury during his junior season left him temporarily paralyzed. After nine months of recovery, he graduated in 1961 with a double major in journalism and political science.
Wheeler's path into racing began in earnest in 1964 when the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company hired him as their motorsport public relations representative. He developed close ties to the NASCAR world before Firestone closed its Charlotte office in 1970. After a stint working in North Carolina civic promotion and real estate, Wheeler was recruited in 1975 by Bruton Smith, the new majority shareholder of Charlotte Motor Speedway, to serve as its president — replacing the outgoing Richard Howard.
Within his first year, Wheeler announced a major renovation program for the speedway. By the early 1980s, the World 600 (now the Coca-Cola 600) had become the second most-attended racing event in the United States, behind only the Indianapolis 500. Wheeler credited the growth to his relentless promotional activity and his belief that NASCAR needed to expand beyond its Southeastern base into a national audience.
In 1985, working with R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, Wheeler conceived The Winston — a race for past champions that eventually became the NASCAR All-Star Race. In 1991, he spearheaded the installation of permanent lights at Charlotte Motor Speedway, the first oval of its size to achieve this, enabling night racing at the facility.
Wheeler also became president and chief operating officer of Speedway Motorsports, Inc. (SMI) when it was formally incorporated in 1995.
Wheeler's signature was the theatrical pre-race stunt or season-long narrative device. Among his most discussed promotions:
For the 1977 NAPA National 500, he exploited a feud between NASCAR drivers Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip by placing a dead chicken inside a shark's mouth and parading the contraption around the infield as a reference to Yarborough's sponsor, Holly Farms Poultry.
For the 1980 World 600, he staged a "Great American Taxi Race" featuring twenty taxicab drivers on the speedway.
For the 1984 World 600, he organized a reenactment of Operation Urgent Fury, the U.S. military intervention in Grenada.
In 1976, he invited Janet Guthrie to enter the World 600 to draw more women spectators, at a time when only 15 percent of the speedway's audience was female.
Among his unrealized ideas was a frontstretch battle between a man and a shark. Wheeler intended to bring in marathon swimmer Moon Huffstetler to kill the shark live at the event. The proposal was ultimately abandoned after colleagues raised objections ranging from animal rights protests to the likelihood that the swimmer would drown.
In January 1989, Wheeler created the NASCAR Sportsman Division, intended to give short-track drivers experience on superspeedways. The series accumulated a troubled safety record over six years, with multiple driver fatalities including Russell Phillips in 1995. Wheeler handed the series to NASCAR's governance in November 1995; it was disbanded before the end of 1996.
Two incidents shadowed Wheeler's tenure at Charlotte. In May 1999, during the VisionAire 500K IndyCar race, a tire assembly from a crashing car flew into the grandstands and killed three spectators. Wheeler ordered the race halted and dispatched goodwill ambassadors to assist survivors and their families. Lawsuits followed, settled in 2000 under confidentiality agreements. In June 2000, after The Winston, a pedestrian bridge connecting the speedway to a parking lot collapsed, injuring 107 people. The speedway was ultimately not found liable by the courts.
After growing disagreements with Bruton Smith, Wheeler retired abruptly from Charlotte Motor Speedway in May 2008, shortly after the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race. He was succeeded by Smith's son, Marcus G. Smith. The departure was widely described as a shock to the NASCAR industry. Wheeler subsequently founded The Wheeler Company, a management consulting firm, and later established Speedway Benefits, a short-track alliance program. He also served as an advisor for the proposed Grand Prix of America Formula One street race near Port Imperial, New Jersey, a project that was ultimately not realized.
In 2010, Wheeler co-authored with Peter Golenbock the autobiography Growing Up NASCAR: Racing's Most Outrageous Promoter Tells All. He and Bruton Smith reconciled in 2020, and Wheeler wrote a laudatory obituary for Smith upon Smith's death in 2022.
Wheeler voiced the character Tex Dinoco in the 2006 Pixar film Cars and reprised the role in Cars 3 (2017), having been recruited by director John Lasseter during a visit to the Charlotte Motor Speedway in 2000.
Wheeler was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2006 and the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 2009. He received a North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame induction in 2004 and was a member of the Carolinas Boxing Hall of Fame since 1992. Former NASCAR president Mike Helton credited Wheeler with taking promotion "to a new level," while Texas Motor Speedway president Eddie Gossage — who learned his trade under Wheeler — stated, "I know that I am a far better promoter as a result of being a graduate of Humpy University."
Wheeler died in Charlotte, North Carolina, on August 20, 2025, aged 86.