After discovering a scoring mistake that allowed Saturday’s Heartland Late Model Tour event to run one too many laps, the series paid runner-up Terry Phillips, the lap-30 leader, an additional $1,500 to cover the error at Legit Speedway Park in West Plains, Mo.

The scheduled 30-lapper saw the checkered flag fall on the 31st lap with winner Tyler Kuykendall of Warsaw, Mo., rubbing past Phillips in turns three and four just ahead of the checkered flag to earn $3,000 to complete the tour’s first-ever race weekend.

Series co-founder Trenton Berry, in a post on his personal Facebook page, apologized for the error in an event manually scored after the track’s electronic scoring loop was damaged earlier in the program.

"We simply missed calling the white flag to the flagman at the proper time,” Berry wrote. “This is not the track's fault, scorers' fault or flagman’s fault. The blame and responsibility to get it correct lies solely with Heartland Promotions. We screwed it up. I am incredibly sorry.”

Berry said he paid Phillips the following day a $1,500 check to cover the difference between the winner’s purse and second-place earnings. Phillips also earned $3,000 for winning Friday’s first-ever series event that was completed without incident.

"It was a mistake, but it worked out, I suppose," Phillips told DirtonDirt in reacting to the decision.

The tour’s rules include a provision for a racing going one lap too long or too short, that the race is officially over when the checkered flag is displayed and the leader crosses the scoring loop. But Berry said that “ethically paying Terry or any racer in a similar position is the only right answer.”