The list of drivers upset over the tire Goodyear brought to Atlanta this past weekend keeps getting longer. Tony Stewart certainly has given us all lots to talk about, and the majority of fans I have heard from through blogs and Sirius radio have been extremely supportive of Smoke and the other drivers. It’s no secret that Goodyear has dropped the ball more than once over the past few seasons, but from the sound of it, this weekend in Atlanta was worse than usual.
Even after a cooling off period, Smoke continued his criticism on his radio show, Tony Stewart Live on Sirius last night. Stewart has opened a can of worms that have slithered all the way to Daytona Beach, and the controversy should compel NASCAR and Goodyear to address the issues.
There have been many calls for Goodyear to be thrown out of the sport in place of a new vendor, such as Hoosier or Firestone. Others want to allow teams to choose their own tires. I say bad idea. Understand that I am the biggest fan of capitalism; however in matters of driver safety, it’s usually best that economics are not a part of the equation. Given the choice between a fast but less safe tire or a slower, safer tire, teams will always go with the tire that gives them the best chance of winning. With multiple vendors all vying to be the tire on the Daytona 500 winning car, safety will inevitably take a back seat.
Tire production is not an exact science. Tracks change yearly because of new paving as well as wear and tear, weather conditions (such as those in Atlanta this weekend – snow, rain, heat, cold), and a new, heavier car with a brand new aero package all add to the challenge of one company. Imagine adding a second, or third to the mix. One miscalculation and there will be cars into the wall all day, add multiple vendors and you increase your risk of an error substantially – especially with the pressure of getting the fastest tire to the track.
A blog about all things good and bad about NASCAR... by a guy full of hot air!
Hefty Hefty Hefty!
Eric McClure decides to circle NHIS backwards and on the SAFER barrier during the 2007 Camping World 200.
About Me
- nh_nascarfan
- Manchester, NH, United States
- Hi all! I'm Mark, infamously known as nh_nascar fan on other blogs. I am a lifelong sports fan, with my favorites being NASCAR, hockey (specifically the AHL and Manchester Monarchs), and football - Go Patriots and LSU Tigers (born in Louisiana with tons of family still there). For work, I am a career paramedic and during my few days off, I spend as much time as I can with my 2 kiddos, wife and 2 step kids. Best of all, my kids are now turning into full blooded race fans!
24 comments:
Hey congrats on your blog. Can't wait to read what you stir up.
Kendria
WOW, look!
It's a new NASCAR blogger, and one with common sense vice disingenuous blather.
Welcome!
Thanks for the support Marc & Kendria... any suggestions on how to make this work would certainly be appreciated!
"any suggestions on how to make this work would certainly be appreciated!"
Best advice I've ever been given was to write, write well and often.
P.S.if you happened to have been by my place in the last 18 hours, it been down hard "thanks" to a hosting screw-up.
I'll be so glad when I send the idiots that run the place to hosting hell and shift to a new service.
Having lived through both Hoosier Tire Wars, I cannot see where safety has ever been better with a Goodyear monopoly than during those tire wars. This is the central fraud of the argument against tire wars - history does not back up the argument that safety is degraded by tire competition. Comparing 1988 (a tire war year) with some very bloody seasons like 1983 or 1991 shows the safety argument is grossly oversold.
And always lost in the argument is the huge increase in revenue and engineering streams provided to more teams by tire wars. The number of different winners jumped dramatically in 1988 to 14 winners among 12 teams, with first-timers like Lake Speed, Phil Parsons, Ken Schrader, and Alan Kulwicki, plus comeback winners like Neil Bonnett and Rahmoc Racing. 1994 was somewhat less dramatic in terms of increases in winners, but it also saw first-timers in Sterling Marlin, Jeff Gordon, and Jimmy Spencer as well as the resurgence of Geoff Bodine.
Tire wars also proved to change the competitive dynamic in Indycars, as the Penske monopoly of the late 1980s and early 1990s was shattered in 1995 by the arrival of Firestone (as well as Honda).
What the sport ultimately needs are two things - a tire that does not have to be changed and keeps the cars stuck to the racetrack, and greater revenue and engineering streams to more teams. A Goodyear monopoly provides neither.
You can argue as much as you like increase in revenue and increased engineering, but those will always take a distant second/third to driver safety. The last thing this sport needs is another tire war. Oddly enough, I have yet to hear one driver support any of the ideas that Monkeesfan is supporting. There is no way to insure that two manufactures can come up with the exact same tire for a particular race, and since you cant, the teams will ALWAYS choose the faster - less safe - tire. If you want to argue that another vendor should be making tires, fine, but it should never be at the expense of safety, meaning it needs to be settled off the track and awarded to a single vendor; be it Goodyear, Firestone, Michelin, or Hoosier.
Drive safety is - and always should be - the number one priority with no number two.
nh nascarfan, you're wrong, they don't go second or third to "driver safety" because safety is not compromised by tire wars and never was.
"I have yet to hear one driver support any of the ideas that Monkeesfan is supporting." That's not an argument, nh, it's a dodge.
The only time where tire safety was a real issue was Charlotte in May 1988; that the heat of the week and the condition of the track (always a concern at Charlotte) might have had something to do with it is always overlooked, because the rest of the 1988 season tires were not any particular issue as far as safety went.
All you're doing is repeating yourself, nh, you're not citing any realworld examples of tire competition hurting driver safety in fact, not just in belief. It's a bogus argument.
There is no safety compromise ina tire war, and revenue and engineering streams for more teams is more important than safety overkill.
Ok Monkeesfan...
Tire one - soft, less safe, but fast
Tire two - harder, safer, slower.
Which do you pick?
Case closed...
http://jetdryer.blogspot.com/
nh - case manifestly not closed, because you persist in the false dichotomy of Tire Wars = soft unsafe tires. Here is the reality - in the two Hoosier Tire Wars, what we got were races in which tires ran longer than fuel; we got races such as Daytona in 1988 and Bristol in 1994 where Hoosier-shod cars ran the entire distance and skipped one tire change after another without losing speed. "Someday teams are going to learn they don't need ten sets of tires to win the Daytona 500," Bob Newton boasted early in 1989, and darn if he didn't show this boast to be true.
By persisting in the dichotomy that you do, you falsify the history, and thus the reality, of tire wars.
Case not closed, nh nascarfan. Come back to me when you or these racers like Mark Martin have a damned clue.
Attempting to change history again to match your warped sense of what actually happened without providing any actual facts huh?
Sadly, you forget that the general consensus of most NASCAR experts - drivers, crew chiefs, and owners - all agree that previous tire wars were indeed bad for the sport and dangerous. Mark Martin, one of the most respected drivers in the history of NASCAR, isnt the only one who proves the Kool Aid you sip isnt quite right...
Some comments on the 1994 tire war in which two drivers (Neil Bonnett and Rodney Orr) lost their lives in tire failure related crashes and Ernie Irvan was seriously injured in a tire failure related crash:
Brett Bodine: ``I'm certainly glad it's over. Everybody is going to be out there on equal tires. It's just better to let the race teams decide who's going to win the race, not the tire companies.''
Steve Hmiel, Mark Martin's crew chief, after the 1994 war ended: ``Goodyear has come up with a good, safe tire. I think it will race real good with no concern over somebody getting hurt because of the tires. Last year, sometimes it felt like it got unsafe.''
Rick Mast, winner of the 1994 Brickyard 400, on the pullout of Hoosier after winning with that company (on Hoosiers): ``It tickles the dickens out of me. It's the best thing that could have happened. It put everybody in a bad spot. When tire companies are in competition, to go faster, your tire's gotta be softer, and softer tires are just not as safe. They're more apt to come apart.''
Jack Rousch: "We will wreck more cars because of this tire war, and people could get hurt because of it”
Junior Johnson: "The biggest thing I see it doing is raising the cost of racing. They're fighting a war and we're paying for it."
Yeah, and I'm the one trying to re-write history. Two dead drivers, one critically injured, and a multitude of tire failures. You want to change Goodyear? Great, thats your opinion, but lets not settle THAT war on the track. There are actual real lives at stake.
http://jetdryer.blogspot.com/
nh - you cite "the general consensus" but can't cite anything specific. Stop citing Mark Martin because he hasn't got a clue, and neither does Brett Bodine or Steve Hmiel or Jerk Roush - they would not have felt that way if they'd gotten the engineering and revenue streams Geoff Bodine got because of the tire war.
Neil Bonnett and Rodney Orr were not killed because of tire issues, period. Hoosier Tire was blamed because it was the convenient scapegoat. Ernie Irvan's bad injury came in the kind of tire issue common to racing regardless of any tire war. When drivers get injured or killed after blown tires during the Goodyear monopoly, where's your disingenuous outrage?
You're rewriting history and it's beneath contempt for you to do so. Tire wars are good for racing and that is a fact. Period. Make Goodyear have to fight Firestone and Hoosier on the track. The extra revenue and engineering streams brought for more teams by tire competition are more important than overblown "risk" cited in the whining of Mark Martin. Real lives are not at stake anymore than they are with the Goodyear monopoly. Get the myth of lives at stake out of your damned head.
Here's the real history of tire wars, nh -
Tire War = tires that don't have to be changed, more revenue and engineering streams for more teams, more winners.
Goodyear monopoly = blown tires, unraceable tires, teams cut off from engineering help.
And you have the nerve to accuse me of rewriting history?
Uhhhmmm... yeah, I do accuse you of rewriting history.
Two dead drivers and one who almost died in one season, every one because of soft tires that blew at high speeds. You are the only one who minimizes the impact that tire failure had on the wrecks; yet you can not cite one credible source that states that it was not due to tire failure/tire wars.
The sheer economic reality of using a faster (less safe) tire practically compels teams to go with the choice that puts them in a better economic situation.
It makes complete sense that every person I cited you accuse of not having a clue simply because they disagree with you.
Can you cite anybody - crew chief, driver, owner - who wants a tire war? Incidentally, cross Dale Jarrett off your list since less than an hour ago on ABC (just before the Nationwide Race) he stated 'NONE OF US WANT A TIRE WAR... OUR FAMILYS WILL THANK YOU FOR IT'.
Oh, yeah, he as a former series champion with 32 wins must be a moron as well since he disagrees with your foolish conjecture.
http://jetdryer.blogspot.com/
"I do accuse you of rewriting history." And it makes you a fool to do so.
None of those 1994 wrecks you cited were with soft tires, and they weren't even because of tire failures - Bonnett and Orr lost control of their cars on a pair of unusually windy days and they shot in opposite lock to the walls.
"You cannot cite one credible source that states it was not due to tire failure/tire wars." Yes I can - tire failures were not cited in those wrecks; the accusation against Hoosier at the time came later that Speedweeks that their tires made the cars looser.
As for Irvan's crash, tire failures are so common that your only source that it was a tire war problem is you jumping to a conclusion.
"It was a well known fact that Goodyear played favorites with tires." - Geoff Bodine, 1996. Game, set, match in favor of tire competition, Mark.
BTW, you cited Rick Mast earlier as being delighted the tire war ended - the end of the tire war meant he lost his only serious engineering help of his career; as a result his one chance to win races disappeared. So Mast is being either a liar or a fool here.
I cite the big picture reality of the sport to support a tire war. Tire competition means more teams get more revenue and engineering help, and the result is more Neither you nor any of these drivers you quote have not cited anything beyond hysteria to oppose a tire war.
BTW, does this logic extend to car manufactuters as well? Should NASCAR decree and official manufacturer of its racecars, such as Chevrolet - Ford is forbidden from fielding teams, Dodge is forbidden from fielding teams, etc.?
Increasxing and spreading out revenue and engineering streams to produce more different winners is always more important than hysteria about "safety" that isn't being compromised.
Perhaps you should research your NASCAR history before you put fingers to keyboard. All 3 accidents, as well as a multitude of others that season, were due to high speed tire failures. By the way, cars do tend to get very loose at high speeds right after they suffer a tire failure.
"It was a well known fact that Goodyear played favorites with tires." - Geoff Bodine, 1996. Game, set, match in favor of tire competition, Mark.
You cite Geoff Bodine as your only argument versus the five (of many) that I gave you and say game, set, match to me? I would argue that Bodines very quote supports why there shouldn't be an on track tire war, if he is correct, as you imply by quoting him, then that is reason enough to not have another tire war on the track. God forbid a company play games with its competition on the track.
Its sad that you believe driver safety is mere hysteria and risking the lives in favor of a perceived increase in competition is good for the sport.
http://jetdryer.blogspot.com/
Mark, don't lecture me about researching NASCAR history because I do that a lot. Neither Bonnett nor Orr's wrecks were because of tire failures; Bonnett's wreck is discussed by Shaun Assael in Wide Open: Days & Nights On The NASCAR Tour where he notes driver error in that wreck.
I cite Geoff Bodine's point because, unlike those other drivers you cite who are just parroting the company line, Bodine goes to the big picture. Thus it refutes all those other drivers you cite. Bodine's quote shows why there needs to be tire competition, because Goodyear is shortchanging too many teams as far as engineering and revenue support goes.
Tire competition is no greater a risk to drivers than a Goodyear monopoly. No company line that you parrot is going to change that.
You research NASCAR history only through people/sites that agree with your warped sense of reality; anyone who disagrees with you is 'not credible', or 'parroting the company line', or they (i.e. Mark Martin) 'doesn’t have a clue'. You quote Geoff Bodine only because you can twist his words into somehow backing you up. You managed to completely disregard some of the most successful people in NASCAR history and expect people to actually believe you are credible? Please... and to deny cut tires caused the wrecks and ultimately deaths of Bonnett and Orr? Even the most basic NASCAR fan realizes that when a car suddenly veers into a wall, untouched by another, it’s almost always a cut tire. The only other possible causes of Bonnetts death were (a) fluid on the track, of which none was found, or (b) driver error, highly unlikely and ambiguous at best. But of course to admit a cut tire would help discredit you more than you already are, so it couldn’t possibly be that. You provide still have yet to find one person in NASCAR who supports a tire war – no driver, no crew chief, no owner. Only you and a handful of people out there who really cant – or wont – see that there are bigger things in racing than ‘increased winners’; ‘more engineering support’, or ‘more revenue for teams’.
Here are a few references of the many out there that point to cut tires causing both wrecks:
http://www.legendsofnascar.com/tragic.htm
Veteran Neil Bonnett was trying to stage a comeback from injuries sustained in the April 1990 running of the TranSouth 500 at Darlington Raceway in South Carolina. A hard crash in that race left Bonnett with amnesia and a bad concussion that would have ended the career of a lesser driver. Fueled by a strong desire to compete, however, he secured a six-race deal with car owner James Finch that was to start with the 500 in 1994. In the first practice session of the week, Bonnett blew a tire exiting Turn 4 and hit the wall head on, dying on impact.
http://nascar.wikia.com/wiki/Neil_Bonnett
Death
Despite the setbacks, Bonnett was encouraged because he had secured a ride and sponsorship for at least six races in the 1994 season with car owner James Finch, including the season opening Daytona 500. But on February 11, 1994, during the first practice session for the 1994 Daytona 500, Bonnett's car suffered a right front tire failure in the track's fourth turn. Bonnett's car hit the outside wall nearly head-on. Bonnett was taken to nearby Halifax Medical Center, but he had died on impact. He was survived by his wife, Susan, and their two children, son David Bonnett (had 19 Busch Series starts), and daughter, Kristen.
http://nascar.wikia.com/wiki/Rodney_Orr
Rodney Orr ( - February 14th, 1994) was a NASCAR driver. He won the 1993 Goody's Dash Series Championship, and had plans to move to the Winston Cup Series in 1994.
Death
Practicing for the 1994 Daytona 500, Rodney cut down a tire in Turn One, lifted off of the ground, and went roof first into the catch fence. Orr died instantly because of massive head and chest injuries.
Mark, I research wherever possible; I research every source I can find. I'm damned tired of you attacking my research methods because you're not qualified to judge anyone's research methods.
In the 14 years that elapsed since those 1994 crashes what you're citing are the very first claims that tire failures caused those wrecks - every story then and later about those wrecks did not mention cut tires. So your sources are of dubious accuracy.
Second, cars do suddenly shoot into walls without cut tires - air-off-the-spoiler wrecks were quite common at that time. Indeed, the way Bonnett and Orr crashed (and Andy Farr earlier that weekend) was not consistent with cut tires - they went into opposite lock, whereas in most cut tire crashes the car spins completely around.
Finally, driver error does play a role in crashes.
You still have not proven anything other than you have a totally warped view of things. Tire wars do not increase risk to drivers - they didn't in the Goodyear-Firestone wars, they didn't in the Goodyear-Hoosier wars. Citing dirver quotes doesn't prove anything when the actual races showed such quotes to be nothing but hot air.
You cannot cite any case against a tire war because none exists. Tire wars = more winners, more revenue and engineering streams for raceteams, more competition. The risk factor is not affected at all, and no amount of claim-mongering on your part disporves this fact.
BTW, Geoff Bodine's quote is not twisted at all - it's the blunt truth that Mark Martin and company refuse to admit.
You're 0-for-the-argument, Mark.
nh, why are you discussing this with this guy? he is one of the biggest fools out here, let it go he will never admit he is wrong.
Do you think everyone out here is a fool? Perhaps you need look in the mirror and examine your own mind set, you are like a two year old who just cant admit that he is wrong. I have been around the sport at least as long as you have, and I clearly remember the tire wars of both 88 and 94. You are misconstruing actual fact which I have cited. The original theory on the causes of the accidents were fluid on the raceway, but investigation showed that there was none. Driver error, although it does exist, was considered by most at the time to be highly unlikely. Wind is a lame excuse, as those speedweeks were certainly not the only windy times in NASCAR history; if it were that much of an issue, cars would have been into the wall every time wind hit the track. In fact, there would have been way more than just these two isolated wind deaths and in researching your theory (which I did, extensively) found a grand total of zero sites that even suggest that as a theory.
You may like Hoosier, you may not like Goodyear. I say good for you, but in the name of safety, there is no place for a tire war on the track.
Here is a quote from Goodyear itself during the 88 tire war - "When there is no competition, you don't design a tire at the edge of the performance envelope. You design a tire to be safe and reliable.”.
Problem is, in order to sell your product, tire design can - and has in the past - get pushed beyond the levels of safety as teams have a 'win at all cost' attitude. Do you think the cars outside the top 35 wouldn't take a less safe tire if it gave them an extra .01 seconds? You bet your ass they do, even if it means running he risk of hitting the wall at 180 mph head on. If you believe anything otherwise, you prove yourself a bigger fool than you already have.
Anonymous, thanks for the support; anyone who reads NASCAR blogs realizes what this guy actually is. He throws around a lot of bunk and fails to back it all up, and believes that people should believe his crap just because he says they should. It is indeed amazing how anyone, including some of the greatest NASCAR figures of all time, who says something that disagrees with his inane thought process is brandished a fool.
http://jetdryer.blogspot.com/
nh nascarfan, no, the only people I think are fools are people who make arguments contrary to reality and persist in such despite being disproven. You treat my citing of how windy it was in the Bonnett and Orr wrecks as if I am calling it a central cause. I'm not calling it that; I'm citing what Darrell Waltrip and other drivers at that time were stating. It might have had a role in those wrecks.
What is manifest is that tire failures were not a cause of either wreck, else tire failure would have been cited in every story about those wrecks, as tire failure was universally cited about Goodyear's 1989 Daytona introduction of radials and the abortion of that introduction after tire failures caused crashes to Bill Elliott and Dale Earnhardt cars before the Busch Clash that year.
You're still parrotting the company line by quoting Goodyear from 1988. You again ignore exactly what Hoosier brought to the table in 1988 and 1994 - they brought a tire that allowed their teams to run 500 mile or 500 lap races without having to change tires as frequently as was the case with Goodyear cars. Time and again Hoosier cars were able to skip tire changes without losing speed.
This manifestly makes nonsense of all the safety harping by yourself and the Goodyear devotees (other than Rick Mast, whose comments about the end of the tire war are baffling) you keep quoting.
As for not backing anything up - history is what backs me up. You don't back up anything you say. Don't lecture anyone about backing up things that are said, pal, because you're manifestly unqualified to do so.
I'm not arguing that Hoosier didn't make a quality tire. The point is simply that given a choice of speed over safety, speed will always win. I have quoted several sources that cite tire failure as the cause of both wrecks, you ignored them. Rick Masts comments are baffling to you because he was a Hoosier guy who won on Hoosier yet flat out said the tire war was bad for racing and he was glad it was over... he blows your inane theory out of the water. Why do you persist on discrediting anyone who believes that safety needs to be the number one priority and that a tire war will negatively effect safety? Big deal if more revenue and more engineering if we have another dead driver... and it seems as though those who strap into the cars should have the ultimate say in their own destiny rather than a couple of half assed bloggers. You would rather discredit their opinions however.
nh - if you're not arguing that Hoosier didn't make a quality tire, then what is the point of your whole disagreement? The "speed will always win" dichotomy is a false one, because the tire wars were not about raw speed as much about making stronger tires as well as getting more teams. What Hoosier did was change the whole competitive dynamic of the sport, and for the better, because not only did it build a better tire, it built a better concept - "Someday teams are going to learn they don't need so many tires to win the Daytona 500," Bob Newton's philosophy stated during Speedweeks 1989, is a far better goal of racing tire companies than the approach Goodyear has had, an approach that talks the talk about safety yet has never backed it up.
Rick Mast's comments are baffling because they were not based on anything in the real world - his comments don't blow anything away because they were false.
"Big deal if we have more revenue and more engineering if we have a dead driver." Mark, get off this bogus dichotomy you keep dredging up. Safety was never compromised in the tire wars - we've gotten plenty more dead drivers in Goodyear's monopoly than we did in any tire war.
That whole "we're in more danger with a tire war" argument is so exaggerated as to be positively suffocating.
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