For the second straight day, Martinsville Speedway was turned into a half-mile laboratory and Jeff Burton was happy to be right in the middle of the experiment.
Burton and four other NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers – Dale Earnhardt Jr., David Ragan, Brad Keselowski and Bobby Labonte – finished up a two-day tire test at Martinsville Speedway on Wednesday. The goal was to help Goodyear come up with a better racing compound for this fall’s TUMS Fast Relief 500.
“Goodyear is always trying to make tires better and they work hard at building different compounds, different rubbers, different constructions,” said Burton who has 21 victories in 18 years of Sprint Cup racing. “They do a lot of lab testing, but really, this is the best place to test, at the race tracks.
“We’ve been picking out the tires we like and then we confirm what we like and don’t like on long runs. So we’ve made a lot of 10 and 20-lap runs and a bunch of 75-lap runs to confirm what we like. That is our main objective to being here.”
With only one or two cars on the track at a time, and no real racing, tire testing seems like a monotonous exercise, but Burton says it is vital.
“There’s always a lot to take away from a tire test,” said Burton, who has one Martinsville win to his credit. “It’s real important for us to come here and get data. The most important piece to the puzzle in our world today is getting data from race tracks, real, live, current data, on the correct tire with good conditions.”
Burton admits there are also selfish reasons involved with tire tests.
“On top of everything we do for Goodyear, you have time to work on your own car,” said Burton. “You just don’t work for Goodyear. Goodyear gives you time at these tests and NASCAR gives you time to concentrate on your car. So that’s why tire tests are so important.”
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