Tommy Baldwin gave a passionate character statement about Rick Ware as Legacy Motor Club is suing Ware’s organization over a charter sale gone awry.
Baldwin, a former team owner himself, is a veteran of the NASCAR industry and current competition director of Rick Ware Racing. He began working for the team in the spring of 2023.
“This goes back to just the way I feel our sport should be run, [which] is integrity,” Baldwin said on this week’s edition of Door Bumper Clear, a podcast he co-hosts on Dirty Mo Media. “The thing that hurts is that they have come out and said a lot of bad things about Rick Ware … and you can say all you want about what goes on at the track and on the track, of the things we’re trying to do, but I’m here to tell you Rick Ware is not any one of those things as a person, as an individual, as a father, as a family member, as what they’re making him out to be. It’s heartbreaking to have to see him go through all this.”
Baldwin then provided a personal anecdote about Ware. In the summer of 2023, Baldwin was diagnosed with cancer, which naturally took him away from racing for six to eight months. In the time Baldwin was not working, he said that Ware “took care of” him, checked on him, and paid him.
“That’s Rick Ware,” Baldwin said. “That’s the guy he is. He has worked his [rear] off to be in this position, to be able to sell a charter, and live the rest of his life the way his family needs to live. He deserves that.”
Legacy Motor Club filed its lawsuit against Ware on April 1. The suit alleges the two sides had a binding deal for Ware to sell one of his charters to Legacy Motor Club, allowing them to expand to three cars, but then Ware backed out of the deal.
The deal seemed to unravel when Ware discovered the terms of the contract had been changed. He believed the sale would be for the 2027 season, but Legacy Motor Club changed the terms for the 2026 season.
RWR has one charter running full-time with Cody Ware in the No. 51. The second charter was leased to RFK Racing, which is only for this year. A team cannot lease the same charter for more than one season.
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In its lawsuit, much of which has been heavily redacted, Legacy said of Ware, “Strapped for cash and unable to compete at Cup Series level by its own admission, RWR needed to sell one of its two Charters. So, on the morning of January 6, 2025, Legacy’s CEO Calvin ‘Cal’ Wells III met with RWR’s representatives – Rick Ware and his broker T.J. Puchyr – to strike a deal. They did. On March 3, 2025, Legacy and RWR executed a Charter Purchase Agreement.”
Baldwin is familiar with the sale of a charter. He sold his charter to Leavine Family Racing and chose for Tommy Baldwin Racing not to run full-time after the 2016 season. The organization ran its last Cup Series race in 2020.
“Shame on me for not having the balls [Ware] did, as much as he has, not waiting to sell mine,” Baldwin said. “I just couldn’t deal with it anymore; I couldn’t deal with the political mess, the people, with people screwing me all the time. I just couldn’t deal with it. This guy has survived all that, and I don’t know how he’s done it. And in the meantime, he’s in the back doing his business, what he needs to be doing, to set himself up and his family to live the rest of their lives comfortably.
“That’s his prerogative. He deserves that. He put himself in that position. I will fight for Rick Ware as much as I’ll fight for anybody right now because that is not Rick Ware.”
Baldwin also defended the race team and its objectives. Ware faced criticism in the past for the performance of his cars and for putting his son on the track. However, Baldwin noted that Ware spent millions of his own money to field Justin Haley in 2024 because there wasn’t enough funding for a full season, and then he decided to pivot.
As Baldwin explained, “It’s gotten to the point where Rick was like, ‘Look, if I’m going to spend my own money, I’m going to spend it on my son. I’m not going to spend any more on anybody else’s career,’ and that was a major decision that he made. He got Robby [Benton] and me together and said, ‘This is my decision, and you guys are going to make it work because this is what I want.’ All right, that’s what we’re going to do.”
The team is 36th in the point standings, but Baldwin said the younger Ware is doing what he needs to on the racetrack to learn and stay out of the leader’s way. He feels if the right amount of funding were plugged into the team, and with Ware’s development, they could develop into a top-15 contender.
“We have a really good race team,” Baldwin said.
