Cup Series driver Denny Hamlin has slammed NASCAR for the way it handled the incident involving Cody Ware in the last lap of the street race in Chicago. Ware crashed into the tire barriers at 93 mph, but the caution flag was delayed by nearly half a minute.
Footage of Ware’s crash has been doing the rounds on social media, highlighting the intensity of the incident. Ware crashed into the tire barriers on Turn 6 due to a brake failure, leaving him no other option but to crash head-on.
WOW! What an insane angle of the last-lap crash for Cody Ware… I can’t believe that wasn’t an immediate caution.
That’s a brutal impact, look how fast he’s going into that barrier… 😳#NASCAR | 🎥: @MagnusCheeks
— Joseph Srigley (@joe_srigley) July 7, 2025
The Athletic’s Jeff Gluck said it was likely that NASCAR was unaware of the speed at which Ware had crashed into the barriers and as a result, the sport waited for him to get out of his car. He said:
“NASCAR did see a car in the barriers but did not know how hard Ware hit. They thought maybe he could back up like Larson did last year so they were holding it to see. If they had known the Ware impact severity, would have thrown the yellow earlier.”
Chris Graythen/Getty Images
However, Hamlin opened up on his Actions Detrimental podcast, saying that NASCAR should have brought out the caution flags without delay. He said:
“This was not a good-officiated race. No question about it [it should be an instant yellow]. That was a massive hit. You have got to throw the caution immediately. That’s not a caution I would have liked to have seen by the way.”
Hamlin made it clear that it was fair for Shane van Gisbergen to have won the race and admitted a green-white-checkered flag could have led to a controversy. However, the 23XI co-owner argued that bringing the flags out is part of the game. He added:
“I’m always going to be on the side of crown the fair winner. The fair winner was SVG. And yes, if you get into a green-white-checkered, you could have a lot of issues. But you know what, that’s part of the deal.
“Sometimes, you have things that you wish didn’t happen in the course of your event, but that’s just bad luck. Regardless of what they tell you, I think no question, rain coming in, the possibility of lightning, the possibility of a complete sh*tshow worth of overtime — all of that played a factor, in my opinion.”
Hamlin then targeted NASCAR for not knowing the intensity at which Ware crashed into the barriers. He said:
“… They’re saying they didn’t see how big the hit was – I don’t understand that. You are not doing your job as officiating if you don’t see – it’s one thing to look and see there’s a car over there. You gotta know how they got over there… I’m very certain in my belief that there was a lot of factors, some bad weather moving in place, that played a factor in when that caution was called.”