NASCAR: Burden on teams to handle tire blistering
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Carl Edwards has had blistering of his right-front tire during Sprint Cup testing at Daytona International Speedway, and it will be up to his Roush Fenway Racing team to find a way to fix the problem.
There are no plans to change the tire for Speedweeks.
"With a perfect tire in a perfect condition, you wouldn't have it, but that's part of why we test - to understand what they've got to do with the front ends to make it go away," Sprint Cup Series Director John Darby said after the second day of testing Tuesday. "A little bit of blistering in the tire doesn't indicate that there's a tire issue."
Goodyear product manager Rick Heinirich said that Casey Mears had a tire that went down from blistering before he hit the wall during the second practice session.
Heinrich said "probably more than a handful" of teams have had heat issues.
"We have had several teams that have had heat issues and had blisters on the shoulder," Heinrich said. "It's a new car. It's a new tire. And that's what the testing is all about - for the teams to figure out where they can go and what they can do.
"The teams that have heat issues are going to need to make some adjustments on the car and get dialed in. There are a lot of teams that have not had a problem. It is strictly a heat issue."
Each team could lease 10 sets of tires for the three-day test.
"It seems like the tires are good and hard and for some reason they're blistering up a little bit," Edwards said. "We're going to keep our drafting runs to a minimum. ... We're going to hang back and see what happens.
"We still have time hopefully that we can get something to work for the next test session and guys can try out. We don't want to hurt our car."
Jeff Gordon also said he had some blistering on both of his right-side tires. He said when there is more rubber on the track, there could be less blistering.
"You always find a little bit of extra wear and temperature when you're testing. ... I don't think it's out of the usual," Gordon said. "You just have to be a little bit cautious."
