Cold Tire Crashes: Tips on Warming Tires

“Everyone knows we crash on cold tires, but riders continue to crash on cold tires.” That started last week’s study of how we’re falling off on cold tires; the underlying mistake in every scenario was our primary focus being somewhere other than our tire temperature.

Last week’s examples revolved around track riding and racing, but I’ve seen cold-tire crashes several turns away from Newcomb’s Ranch and The Rock Store back in my California days, and cold-tire crashes as riders left dealerships and bike shows trying to impress. The cold, unwilling tires have no idea if it’s on Mulholland Drive or Road America; they need heat to work. Let’s look at how to bring and retain the heat.

Tire experts Tony Romo and Mark Schellinger have witnessed cold-tire crashes as top-level racers, tire-manufacturer employees, and winning crew chiefs. Jason Pridmore is an AMA national champion and World Endurance champion who, like me, Romo, and Schellinger, began racing before tire warmers. These riders know the problems and solutions. As they walk us through some processes, I will add some personal notes and thoughts.

Schellinger

Mark Schellinger ran America’s largest Michelin race-tire distributorship and is very clear about warming tires: “The quickest way to warm a tire is straight-line braking and accelerating. That flexes the tire carcass and flex creates friction which creates heat.” This is something track riders can do in the empty part of a paddock after second call, even down pit lane if nobody is behind you; make sure you are off to the side of the pit lane and your left leg is off the footpeg to signal your intentions. This has become my habit on every street and track ride: accelerating and braking to warm tires, beginning gently at first and building pressures as the tires warm.

“Weaving back and forth doesn’t put much flex into the tires, and most clubs have made rules against weaving because of the danger to following riders,” Schellinger continues. “In the bias-ply days we’d weave to remove the mold-release compound on the tires, but that is no longer necessary.”

Schellinger has worked closely with the MRA’s (Colorado) six-time club champion Ryan Burke. “We’ll set our tire pressures on the warmers at 200 degrees Fahrenheit,” he says, “and Ryan will start his warm-up lap aggressively, but not quite flat out. But by the end of the warm-up lap, he’ll be at 100 percent.” Schellinger returned to racing recently on my CW long-term Tracer GT, and I watched him put his advice into play because he ran Dunlop Q4s with no warmers. He accelerated and braked as much as possible before the warm-up lap started, and built cornering speed all through the warm-up lap, while braking and accelerating very aggressively with little lean angle.

Schellinger adds, “Race tires need heat, and that makes them a poor choice for street riding. Race tires need tire warmers, and I view tire warmers as well-controlled warm-up laps. You can run race tires without warmers, but it takes time and diligence when you roll out on the track. Much depends on the ambient temperatures of the day, but I’d say three or four laps minimum to get an unwarmed race tire to begin to work. Luckily, almost every tire maker has high-performance street tires that are awesome on the track and don’t require warmers.”

Romo

Tony Romo is Dunlop’s roadrace technician with an impressive racing and tuning résumé; this expert stresses a very important point: “What so many riders overlook are track temperature, pavement condition, and temperature. On many cold-tire crashes I’ve seen, the track just wasn’t warm enough for the pace of the rider. We’ve got to let the track come up to the levels of the tire.”

Romo encourages track riders to pay special attention to warm-up procedures when track temps are below 15 degrees Celsius (59 degrees Fahrenheit). “You want to have warmers on your tires between 30 and 60 minutes,” he says. “I advise riders to not pull warmers at third call, but pull them when they hear bikes rolling onto the track. If you pull them and roll out at third call and there’s a delay, the heat comes out of the tires very quickly, especially on a cool day.” Romo geeks out on Formula 1 tire-temperature data and was shocked to see a blanket-heated tire drop 25 degrees Celsius (77 degrees Fahrenheit) by the time the car arrived in turn 1.

Pridmore

Jason Pridmore is the type of rider Romo refers to because this roadracing champion and riding instructor has only fallen off on a cold tire once, when the tire warmer failed and was pulled with a gloved hand. Pridmore has ridden and raced thousands of laps on a variety of tires, always respecting tire temperature first.

Pridmore thought about the first few corners of each track. “If I exited the pits into long-radius corners,” Pridmore explains, “I knew I could build or maintain the heat because I had to use the edge for a long time. I remember that Magny-Cours was tough because the first few corners were short-radius.”

This is the level of focus champions put into the processes of gathering championship points. The first few corners of Pridmore’s first lap were examined for tire-temperature retention. He pushed immediately to not just win races, but to keep heat in the blanket-warmed tires. Pridmore proved the adage that “you win championships on the bad days”—the days when your rivals fall off a cold tire because they were not mentally ahead of the game.

Notes to End

I won two No. 1 plates at Willow Springs back when we raced every month of the year and tire warmers were not yet invented. Since 1997 I’ve taught schools every month of the year on high-performance street tires with no warmers. My thoughts:

Feel this: As we develop the ability to relax at speed on the motorcycle, the tires will constantly inform us of their heat/traction levels. Right now readers are wondering, “How many turns until the tires are ready?” We want solid answers like “three rights and five lefts,” but that’s not how this sport works.

Solar heated: On the next chilly but sunny day, put your bare hand on a car or bike tire. Feel the sunny part, feel the shaded part. Amazing difference. Now you know why experts’ bikes (without warmers) are parked in the sun if possible, on these chilly days.

Wind shielding: If you run warmers on a windy day, add a second layer to insulate the warmers. Ideally this second layer is wind-proof and can be something as simple as a windbreaker jacket—anything to block the wind that’s taking heat off your warmers, tires, and wheels.

Second call: When possible, I’m suited up at first call and on the bike at second call, out in the empty part of the paddock braking and accelerating to warm the tires when I don’t have tire warmers. It’s good for my tire temps and good for my brain; we both roll onto the track warmer.

Habit: On every street ride, I do two or three hard stops on the frontage road that follows the dirt road I live on. It helps me adapt to the day’s bike, but also allows me to put heat in the tires as quickly as possible. A quick check on following traffic is mandatory before these two or three stops. Try to do these stops early in your ride because you never know when you need warm tires.

Fast but not risky: At ChampSchool we interchange the words “lean angle” and “risk.” Our instructors run stunningly fast warm-up laps on ambient-temperature tires, but with minimal risk, minimal lean angle, when compared to hot-tire laps.