Goodyear to debut new left-side tire for Cup Series Playoffs race at Martinsville

Goodyear will introduce a new left-side tire for Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs race, bringing a softer compound to Martinsville Speedway.

Goodyear officials indicated that the new left-side tire should wear more aggressively than the previous left-side setup at the 0.526-mile Virginia short track. That should bring more tire fall-off to Sunday’s Xfinity 500 (2 p.m. ET, NBC, Peacock, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App), the postseason’s Round of 8 finale and the penultimate race of the Cup Series season.

Two of the eight remaining playoff-eligible teams were involved in the New Hampshire tire test — Christopher Bell driving for the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota team and defending Cup champion Joey Logano with the No. 22 Team Penske Ford group. No. 20 crew chief Adam Stevens said Tuesday that he expects the extra track time to be helpful, even though there are significant differences in the track types (New Hampshire’s layout being roughly twice the size of Martinsville) and the weather (with far cooler temperatures for the race this weekend vs. the test in the summertime heat).

“It’s something we have to lean on and study a little bit,” Stevens said. “We actually got some laps on the Martinsville left-side, so I know a lot of guys didn’t and don’t that certainly didn’t do the test. So, we do have some data to corroborate and look at and study. It’s going to be a different race. You know that the track surface is so much different, and then the ambient conditions are going to be so much different, that how it takes rubber and lays rubber and behaves is going to be a completely different animal, but it’s something I’d rather have than nothing.”

Paul Wolfe, crew chief for Logano and the No. 22 team, agreed, noting how high temperatures in the low 60s with a forecast for cloud cover could impact tire wear and performance.

“I’ve been a part of these tests and seen tire wear drastically change based on temperature, and we’ve seen it at Bristol [Motor Speedway] as well, so a little bit of a question mark,” Wolfe said. “But you know, that’s what we have to prepare for, the unknown, and trying to put our best foot forward as the most educated guess we can of what’s going to happen, and how much does that really change the setup in the car. There are things potentially that you’re going to do differently if you knew exactly what was going to happen, so you find yourself making compromises potentially with that unknown.”

Tire setups for Saturday’s Xfinity Series race and Friday night’s Craftsman Truck Series event will remain the same as they have at Martinsville since 2022. All three NASCAR national series will determine their Championship 4 fields after Martinsville.

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