Nitro Dogs Racing

Goodyear’s new fuel racing tire gets thumbs-up from crew chiefs, drivers

At every NHRA national event, Goodyear engineers are on hand to collect data and interact with teams. The Goodyear Eagle D2550 tire was introduced after a lengthy research and development period.

At this year’s Mopar Mile-High NHRA Nationals in

Denver, all Top Fuel and Funny Car teams were required to begin using a new Goodyear fuel-racing tire. Although the new tire, designated D2550, incorporates several features that make it different from its predecessor, most NHRA teams found the transition to the new rubber to be surprisingly easy despite a lack of testing opportunities.

Several factors helped assure a smooth transition to the D2550 tire, including the cooperation between NHRA drivers and Goodyear engineers during the tire’s development process. Top Fuel racers Tony Schumacher, Cory McClenathan, Morgan Lucas, Rod Fuller, Dave Grubnic, Clay Millican, and Whit Bazemore as well as 14-time NHRA POWERade world champion John Force and Funny Car’s Ashley Force, Tony Pedregon, Phil Burkart Jr., Gary Scelzi, Del Worsham, Ron Capps, and Tim Wilkerson tested the new tire and exchanged data with Goodyear. The end result is a tire that has received unanimous approval from NHRA competitors who cite consistency, durability, and longevity as its biggest attributes. 

Wilkerson, who has been the points leader since April with four wins and is in the midst of the most successful campaign of his career, is one of many drivers who have praised the new tire.

“Goodyear really did a good job with those things,” said Wilkerson. “In fact, I wish they would have come out at the beginning of the year. They seem to last longer. I don’t know if just the change in compound makes them harder and gives them the life we’re having out of them, but that’s good.”

As a driver, crew chief, and team owner, Wilkerson is not only impressed by the tire’s performance but also its longevity, which has helped stem the escalating costs of running a nitro team.

Current Funny Car points leader Tim Wilkerson was one of the many fuel racers who evaluated the new D2550 tire. He claims that he’s able to get five or more runs on a set of the new tires.

“It’s actually saving us a little money from what we were using before, and that’s a good thing,” he said. “It used to be you’d get two runs out of the tire, and that’s the minimum runs on them now. Sometimes, you can get four or five or more out of these, so it’s pretty hard to complain about that. And they are very consistent. They seem to be good out in the middle of the day. When the track’s hot, they don’t seem to go away, so it’s all positive.” The new D2550 tire replaces the D2420, which was introduced in

Gainesville in 2006, and it differs from previous models largely due to the method in which it’s constructed.

“We used a new process to develop this tire,” said Carolyn Ashbee, Goodyear’s sales account manager. “The carcass is still man-made, but the tread was made by a machine, and it is continuously wound, which makes the tire uniform and consistent. This is a process we have previously used in our dirt tire, but we had never tried it in drag racing, so we weren’t sure how it would work. We did the initial testing in mid-2006, and the feedback has been excellent.

“They [NHRA fuel teams] love the new tires because it’s been an easy transition for them. Reports that we have gotten from our engineers indicate that the teams need to make few, if any, changes to their tune-up. This tire was officially debuted in

Denver, and there was some concern because the new chassis rules also took effect at that race, but it has been an easy transition. In the past, tire wear has also been an issue, and we’ve had some teams get up to 12 runs on a set of tires, which obviously helps their budgets.”

John Force Racing crew chief Bernie Fedderly noted that the longevity of the new tires came without a noticeable decrease in performance. “Anytime you can get a decrease in wear, we’re very happy,” said Fedderly. “It doesn’t seem to be giving up a lot in performance.”

As Ashbee noted, the new tire, combined with the introduction of 1,000-foot racing in Top Fuel and Funny Car, has helped dramatically improve tire life for fuel-racing competitors. In prior years, competitors had sometimes gotten as little as two or three runs out of a set of rear slicks, but there are reports that with the new tire and the new distance, some racers are running their tires for as many as 12 runs. John Force Racing crew chief Bernie Fedderly noted that the consistency of the new tire has helped reduce the vast number of variables in nitro racing, making for better side-by-side racing.“They balance up real nice,” Fedderly said. “They seem to be a good, nicely shaped tire, and I guess the new construction methods are making them a little smoother. The tire doesn’t seem to suffer a lot for traction, which is kind of a little bit surprising because there is a compound change as well. It’s a little bit harder compound, I believe, so it’s got excellent wear characteristics. Anytime you can get a decrease in wear, we’re very happy. It doesn’t seem to be giving up a lot in performance, and that’s certainly good. The other thing about it is with the different sidewall construction, we haven’t seen any issues in the sidewall or anything, so we’re real pleased. So far, I’m real impressed. I think this would still be a superior tire even if we were running the quarter-mile.”

Although the new tire has received high praise, Ashbee was quick to point out that Goodyear is committed to drag racing and work continues on the next generation of drag racing tires.

“We are not done,” said Ashbee. “We are always in the process of gathering and evaluating data, and we currently have another new tire in the works. We will apply everything that we have learned from this tire to the new one. At this point, I’m not sure when it will be done, but it will be available as soon as possible.”