Team Penske reached into its wallet at Richmond Raceway last August, purchasing a set of tires from Rick Ware Racing after Joey Logano destroyed his No. 22 Ford in Friday practice. The transaction between NASCAR’s elite and one of its slowest teams highlighted a rarely used rule that lets organizations buy resources from competitors.
The defending Cup Series champion had blown a right front tire on his 21st practice lap, hitting the Turn 4 wall hard enough to require overnight repairs. More problematic than the body damage was the lost tire set. NASCAR had allocated just eight sets for the weekend at the three-quarter-mile Virginia short track.
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Practice Disaster Forced Penske’s Hand
Logano sat last on the speed charts before the tire failure. His Ford felt tight from the opening laps, and the three-time champion was grinding through long runs trying to understand the handling. The right front let go heading through Turns 3 and 4, sending him straight into concrete.
Richmond’s August 2025 race featured NASCAR’s tire choice experiment. Teams received six sets of durable prime tires with yellow sidewalls plus two sets of faster-wearing option tires with red sidewalls. Burning through one set before qualifying left the No. 22 operation at a significant disadvantage for a 400-lap race.
Crew chief Paul Wolfe’s team repaired the car, but Logano couldn’t complete a qualifying lap Saturday. A persistent right front rub prevented him from running at speed. He’d start 38th regardless, but racing one tire set short against 37 other cars made the weekend nearly impossible.
How NASCAR’s Tire Transfer Rules Work
Penske contacted Rick Ware Racing and worked out a deal. The financial terms weren’t disclosed. RWR agreed to sell one of their tire sets, and NASCAR’s rules allowed it with one condition: the selling team must make a qualifying attempt.
That requirement prevents teams from fielding second cars purely as tire storage or stockpiling extra sets for their primary entries. Cody Ware took the No. 51 Ford out for his qualifying run, satisfying the rule and completing the transaction.
The transfer was legal. But it raised questions about competitive balance between organizations operating at opposite ends of the performance spectrum.
Hamlin Questioned the Fairness
Denny Hamlin addressed the situation days later on his “Actions Detrimental” podcast. The 11-time Richmond winner wondered about the specifics.
“Did the 51 just run a set short?” Hamlin asked. “I wonder how much Penske paid them for that. They obviously paid them, Rick Ware obviously took it.”
Hamlin stopped short of criticizing the deal. He acknowledged Logano’s practice crash appeared to stem from bad luck rather than mistakes. The qualifying attempt rule exists specifically to prevent teams from gaming the system.
“I guess there’s a rule that you do have to make a qualifying attempt if you choose to transfer over,” Hamlin said. “What that does is it keeps you from having an extra set of fresh tires.”
The Gap Between These Two Teams
Rick Ware Racing finished last among charter teams in 2025. Cody Ware, the team owner’s son driving the No. 51 Ford, ended the season 36th in points with zero top-10 finishes. His 30.4 average finish and best result of 13th at Atlanta told the story of a team miles behind the competition.
At Richmond, Ware started 37th and finished 32nd, completing 397 of 400 laps. His race meant little beyond collecting points and avoiding crashes.
Team Penske won six Cup races in 2025. Joey Logano held the championship trophy from the previous season. The organizations existed in different universes performance-wise, making the tire purchase feel like a handout to help elite talent overcome bad luck.
For RWR, selling tires to a competitor made financial sense. Small teams operate on tight budgets, and Penske presumably paid market rate or better. Whether NASCAR should allow such transactions depends on your view of competitive balance.
Logano Salvaged a Top-Five
Starting from the rear didn’t stop the No. 22 Ford. Logano worked through traffic steadily, showing the speed his team couldn’t find Friday. A second flat tire during the race created another setback, but he kept charging forward.
Both failures came from track debris, not setup problems or aggressive driving.
“We had a flat tire in practice and then another flat tire in the race and both of them were punctures,” Logano said afterward. “It’s not like we were being too aggressive or anything like that, it’s just running over crap on the racetrack.”
The fourth-place finish validated Penske’s decision to buy replacement tires. The investment turned a potentially disastrous weekend into a solid points haul heading into the playoffs.
What This Says About Modern NASCAR
The Penske tire transfer at Richmond exposed something most fans never see: the business deals between teams that happen away from cameras. NASCAR’s rulebook allows these transactions as long as qualifying attempts are made, creating opportunities for cash-strapped backmarkers to monetize their assets.
Smaller operations can sell equipment, parts, or tires to better-funded competitors. Larger teams can buy their way out of mistakes or bad luck. The system works if you believe money should solve problems. It raises concerns if you think every team should face the same consequences for practice crashes.
Rick Ware Racing switched to Chevrolet and formed a technical alliance with Richard Childress Racing for 2026, trying to close the performance gap that made them willing sellers. Whether that improves their results or just changes which manufacturer they run at the back remains to be seen.
The tire deal at Richmond might stay a one-off situation, or it could become more common as teams realize the rules permit it. Either way, NASCAR tire transfer between Penske and Cody Ware proved that in professional racing, almost everything has a price.
