(By Greg Engle)
Posted: Sunday,December 21st, 2008
Is there a tire war in NASCAR’s future?
Despite efforts to remain low key, Firestone was discovered testing stock car tires at Homestead-Miami Speedway this past week.
A Chip Ganassi Racing ARCA stock car driven by Scott Pruett tested on the road course. But an executive with Firestone said the test was nothing more than that, a test.
“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,” Al Speyer, executive director of Firestone/Bridgestone motorsports told SpeedTV.com’s Robin Miller.
“It was a brandless program. There was no name on the tires or the uniforms or even the tire machines. And the car was painted gray,” he added. “We were just trying to be as low key as possible.”
Goodyear is the current sole supplier of tires to NASCAR and has been since 2000. But competitors criticized them several times during the 2008 season especially after the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, which was reduced to 10-12 laps segments due to tire failures.
The current contract for Goodyear runs through 2011.
“NASCAR did not come to us and ask us to test,” said Speyer. “But we’re currently talking to a lot of sanctioning bodies, ARCA, USAR and NASCAR and, yes, we’re interested in developing a stock car tire.
“But we don’t have a specific timetable or contract with anybody,” he added.
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