NASCAR chief says failure to follow 'unwritten rule' lost Denny Hamlin win

A NASCAR competition director has taken responsibility for the wreck which stole what would have been a second win of the season from Denny Hamlin on Sunday.

A caution – the first of the race for cause – came out with just two laps to go when Cody Ware suffered a tire failure in Turn 4, sending him into a spin and taking the race to overtime.

Hamlin had been leading eventual winner Tyler Reddick at the time of the caution and looked set for the win, but fell back at the restart to fourth place as the 23XI Racing driver took a fifth victory of the season.

The Cup Series veteran seemed ignorant of Ware's tire issue immediately after the race, saying first 'I need Cody Ware running dead ass last not to wreck', then adding in later comments 'It’s Cody Ware, six laps down, wrecking, I don’t know, just add it all up'.

NASCAR TODAY: Hamlin suffers more overtime heartbreak as Busch slams 'boneheaded' moves

NASCAR competition director takes responsibility for costly wreck

Tommy Baldwin, competition director for Ware's Rick Ware Racing team, has now taken full responsibility for the issue – blaming himself for pushing his driver to stay out and pushing on tires which had done more than 60 laps at that point, just to try to potentially challenge for 36th instead of 37th.

Speaking on the Door Bumper Clear podcast on Monday, Baldwin said: “I know Cody’s getting a lot of flak, but it’s my fault. At the end of the day, it’s my fault. That’s what I get paid to do and not for him to make any mistakes.

"We were just beat down, man. We were running like sh*t all weekend. We unloaded like s**t, we raced like s**t, we did the drive around in the third stage trying to hopefully get a caution, get a lap back, try to get with the three or four guys we could maybe race again. We were just deflated, we were all done."

Rick Ware Racing chief: Shame on me

“I’m taking the blame because I should have just said, ‘You know what, our gamble lost. Let’s just come put tires on and not make any mistakes, not cause any problems'.

"It’s an unwritten rule I feel in the garage, you do not want to be part of changing any outcome of the race – no matter what it is. I don’t care if it’s manufacture or whatever, you do not want to do that.

“It’s all about respect, and I just hate it because I am on the plane sitting down and saying to myself, ‘I could have did one thing, come over the radio, and told Jerry [Kelley] let’s just take our medicine, take four tires, we’re already two seconds off the pace', and we could have done it.

"We were just beat up, man. I was sitting there, I was done. Shame on me for losing focus on the whole thing, and I’m taking the blame.”