Firestone tests stock car tires

[call_me_andrew]

http://auto-racing.speedtv.com/article/miller-firestone-and-nascar/

I'll just give the highlights.

"Scott Pruett was testing one of Chip Ganassi's stock cars this week on the road course at Homestead-Miami Speedway and that's not really newsworthy.

But the fact he was on Firestone tires makes it very interesting.

SPEEDtv.com has confirmed that Pruett ran Ganassi's ARCA car on Wednesday and Thursday with Firestone rubber.

"It was not a Firestone test and it was not a NASCAR test, it was a technical exercise to try and develop current stock car technology," said Al Speyer, executive director of Firestone/Bridgestone motorsports."


"Goodyear has been the exclusive supplier for NASCAR since 2000 and has a contract through 2011."


""We used the road course because the natural progression is to start out with an easier application and work our way up to a superspeedway. We've got things started, we'll gather our results and we'll continue testing in 2009.""

[RaceFanStan]

My guess would be that Firestone is hoping to break into ARCA (a non-NASCAR series) to develop tires ...
perhaps Firestone is hoping they can have NASCAR acceptable tires by the time Goodyear's contract runs out. :eek:
2011 could be an interesting year if a tire war develops. http://i57.photobucket.com/albums/g202/gr8link/orn/00.gif

[call_me_andrew]

Or a potential tire war between Firestone and Hoosier in ARCA.

[harvick#1]

a tire war with goodyear, goodyear will go running, just like what they did in F1, but its time for goodyear to leave, Bridgestone/Firestone is a great racing tire supplier and will improve the tire quality in nascar

[Mark in Oshawa]

Well the gauntlet has been thrown down and just about time. I suspect the Firestone/Bridgestone people were sitting at home watching the debacle at Indy this year when the NASCAR boys showed up and thought " it is about time someone brought this farce to an end".

Goodyear has squandered so much of the capital they had with race fans over the years....and last August....people are now seeing Goodyear as a joke. It maybe isn't quite fair.....but it is going to happen.

Kudo's to Firestone for pushing into this area, and part of me suspects they wanted to be spotted. Remember ISC owns Homestead and ISC and NASCAR are VERY close. This test was NASCAR's subtle way of saying to Goodyear that they are not the only game in town and by 2011 they will be life and death to hang onto this monopoly.