Yahoo Finance’s Brian Sozzi takes a deep dive into the processes and costs that go into creating Goodyear’s prestige racing tires for Nascar and the NHRA.
Video Transcript
BRIAN SOZZI: Goodyear has had a long, storied 100 year history in the sport of racing. It all began for Goodyear back in 1901, when Ford founder Henry Ford put Goodyear rubber on his car sponsored by the Detroit Driving Club. Come 1922, and after years of wins, Goodyear dropped out of active race participation and made its return in 1958.
In the 1960s, Goodyear scored major victories at the prestigious 24 Hours LeMons with legends Dan Gurney and Bob Bondurant behind the wheel of a GT Cobra. Goodyear continues to be the dominant tire player in all things racing. Producing racing tires by hand out of its high tech Akron, Ohio manufacturing plant, Goodyear makes every racing tire produced for NASCAR’s top three series, as well as the NHRA Top Fuel league.
The company churns out more than 100,000 tires each year for NASCAR. About 4,000 tires are brought to the track by Goodyear on a typical NASCAR race weekend.
The racing tire of today has come a long way from those Henry Ford days. A NASCAR tire is constructed to handle speeds of more than 200 miles per hour. Each NASCAR tire is 15 inches, weighs 24 pounds, has an RFID tag, and the name of the person that made the tire on a sticker. The tire life ranges from 80 to 100 miles, or the distance it takes to use a full tank of fuel. Each tire cost $503. As for the NHRA tires, they’re designed to handle speeds in excess of 300 miles per hour. The front tires for a Top Fuel car go for $274 and cost $919 for the ginormous rear tires. I’m Brian Sozzi for Yahoo Finance.