Tire Wars in the 1960s

By Sigur Whitaker.
Times were changing at the Speedway. The last time Goodyear Tire & Rubber won was in 1919. In subsequent years, they withdrew from providing tires, but in 1964, they reappeared at the Speedway. Not only was Firestone’s cross-town rival Goodyear vying for inclusion in the race, but so were Armstrong Tire Company, owned by Sears-Roebuck, in support of Mickey Thompson, and British tire company Dunlop in support of Jimmy Clark. The tire companies, along with fuel companies, spark plug companies, and other accessory companies, recognized that racing, then the second most popular sport in the nation, was one of the best ways to sell their products.

Testing was very important to the tire companies. Historically, tires at IMS were stiff because of the brick track. However, over the years, significant portions of the track had been paved, so softer tires would provide better grip and more speed. The question the tire companies had to solve was which compound would work best at the Speedway. The Goodyear tires used a softer configuration. The unknown was if they could stand up to the wear and tear of the Speedway.

On May 17, Jimmy Clark took the pole position in his Lotus Ford with a record-breaking speed of 158.828 mph. An established racer in Great Britain, Clark was in his second year at the Speedway. Afterwards, Speedway press attaché Bill Marvel quipped, “They just declared Akron a disaster area.”

Over the first weekend of qualifying, Goodyear did not have any drivers qualify.

Controversy arose over the softer Goodyear tires. Some drivers claimed the soft tires were not made available to them before the trials. Goodyear responded that they have been at the track since May 1, but were available only for a rear-engine car. Drivers without rear-engine cars protested that it gave others an unfair advantage.

By May 21, the drivers who had been running on Goodyear tires, including A. J. Foyt, Len Sutton, and Jim Hurtubise, switched to Firestone. Goodyear would have to wait until 1965 to challenge Firestone. On the final weekend of qualifying, Firestone had 18 cars in the race, Dunlop 2, and Sears Allstate 1. Both Goodyear and Firestone spent thousands of dollars and had logged more than 10,000 miles testing their tire compounds.

Just because Goodyear didn’t have any cars in the 1964 race, they did not give up. When the track opened in 1965, they were back. They had a new innovation—a lifeguard inner tire that holds air pressure even when the outer tire is punctured, reducing the danger at high speeds. One of the drivers using Goodyear tires was two-time winner A. J. Foyt. Goodyear’s “tire within a tire” was tested by NASCAR driver Richard Petty. When the tire was purposely slashed, Petty was still able to control the car. The advantage is that if the outer tire is damaged and goes flat, the axle drop is approximately ¾-inch as compared to four to five inches for the standard type of tire. The disadvantage of this type of tire for racing is that it was about 3 ½ pounds heavier in front and five pounds heavier in the rear than the conventional tube-type racing tire.

Goodyear offered drivers a choice of three different tires—a tubeless, a tube-type, and the company’s Lifeguard model, which was described as a cross between the other two. Each tire had the same compound, which Goodyear believed would “provide faster speed, longer wear, greater durability and improved handling characteristics.” Goodyear’s new Lifeguard tire was developed from the work done on its passenger car tires. Both sides in this tire war were confident of their tires. Jim Loulan, manager of racing tire development for Goodyear, said, “We feel our racing tire this year has double the wear of Firestone. Right now, we have our tires on 50 per cent of the cars on the track, and we feel we’ll hold that percentage in the race itself. Firestone Jim disputed Firestone’s claims. “I don’t see how they (Goodyear) can make any statements about double the wear of our tires.” He went on to say that they believed they had the finest racing tire ever built.

Unfortunately for Goodyear, the day before qualifications, Gordon Johncock’s roadster’s right front tire started chunking. Usually caused by excess heat, chunking is when pieces of tread detach from the tire.

The real test, of course, would be qualifications. A. J. Foyt took the pole position using Goodyear tires and, in the process, set new on and four lap qualifying records of 161.958 mph and 161.233 mph, respectively. While Goodyear tires took the pole position, at the close of the first day of qualifying, Firestone had twelve cars in the field compared to seven for Goodyear.

While running a fuel test, Foyt’s car experienced chunking of the right rear tire, which he attributed to using new shocks and the safety inner tube tire, which heats up quicker. He planned to go back to his normal setup. It wasn’t only Foyt experiencing chunking problems; Billy Foster and Don Branson also had the issue while running endurance tests. The Goodyear engineering crew needed to find an answer to the issue. Otherwise, eight of the twenty-one cars that qualified on the first weekend were in jeopardy of being eliminated from the field of 33. Goodyear engineers identified the problem as a small “blade fold” during production. The tread depth of the Goodyear tires was 7/32 of an inch compared to Firestone’s tread depth of 5/32 of an inch. The 1964 Firestone tread depth was 7/32 of an inch, but for 1965, they had a softer tire compound and reduced the depth so the tire would run cooler. New tires were being built at the Akron plant to conform to USAC regulations of hardness, size, and design as the qualifying tires. They expected the new tires to arrive at the Speedway in two days.

Goodyear engineers seemed to have solved the problem until USAC officials changed their minds about Goodyear’s plan to produce tires with a tread depth of 5/32 of an inch. Initially, USAC officials said that tread depth wasn’t one of the measurements in the rules. So, Goodyear tires needed to be 7/32 inch deep. Chief steward Harlan Fengler announced that the new tires would not be permitted to run because they “were altered.” Goodyear officials immediately protested Fengler’s ruling.

Goodyear's solution would be to buff the tires down to a 5/32 inch depth until, on May 21, Fengler ruled that no machine-buffed tires would be permitted. The tires shipped from Akron were buffed at the factory down to 5/32-inch depth. That left the drivers who qualified on Goodyear tires with a problem. They could run on the tires on which they qualified, they could get waivers from all the other participants to change tires, or they could somehow get Fengler to permit the use of the buffed tires.

With the machine-buffed tires ruled illegal, the drivers were allowed to wear down their tires on the race track. They had two practice days and two hours during carburetion tests. James Loulan promised that Goodyear would be ready for the Memorial Day race.

The field for the 1964 race was 18 roadsters, twelve rear-engine cars, and three Novis. The field averaged 152.058 mph. For the 1965 race, there were 25 rear-engine cars, six roadsters and two STP-Novis. Significantly, speed had jumped, and the starting field averaged 156.058 mph, an increase of 3.518 mph. Goodyear had twelve drivers qualify for the race. Firestone still dominated the field with 21 cars.
 
The race, run on Monday, May 31, was won by the flying Scotsman Jimmy Clark using Firestone tires. All was not lost for Goodyear. Don Banson finished eighth, and Al Unser finished tenth. Goodyear officials were encouraged by the fact that they had no tire problems during the race. While they didn’t achieve their goal of winning, they showed well. Goodyear would return for the 1966 race.