WHY DONT NASCAR TIRES HAVE TREAD

The reason NASCAR tires don’t have tread is simple: grip. The tires you find on street cars have tread to provide grip in wet conditions. The tread channels water away from the tire’s contact patch. In fact, NASCAR indeed has a rain tire that is used for the Nationwide Series. If our dry-weather tires (also known as “slicks”) were to have tread it would remove rubber that could otherwise be making contact with the asphalt and provide more grip. Some racing series, such as short-track divisions and Formula 1 purposefully add tread or grooves to their tires to slow cars down in the turns.

If it didn’t rain, your tires wouldn’t have grip either. That’s why it’s very important to keep an eye on the tread-depths and tire wear on your street-car. If you were to hit a wet patch with no tread it could spell disaster

Post race inspection rules change

2/2011
Post race inspection rules change a tad: In 2011, NASCAR will have two random teams selected for post-race inspection, John Darby, Cup series director explained. Last year, NASCAR took the first car out as a random for post-race inspection. That's why you saw cars go to the garage early and go back out at different times in the race to not be the first car out. Darby said that NASCAR is changing how that random will be selected. "There will still be a random inspection from the cars outside the top 35 (in car owner points), but we're going to make it more random,'' Darby said. "We're going to do it very similar to the way we do the (random) for the big group of the cars at the end of the race, drawing a number kind of situation so nobody really knows who that random will be.'' What will happen is that the crew chief of the first car out of the race will be asked by NASCAR to select two numbers. One will represent a car not in the top 35 in car owner points to be selected for post-race inspection. Another number will represent a car in the top 35 in car owner points for post-race inspection