Three drivers suffered flat right front tires in the opening Stage of the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday. Erik Jones suffered a race-ending tire failure on lap 23. DiBenedetto’s race came to an end after a flat on lap 48. Truex suffered a tire failure on lap 73, but fortunately for the 2017 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Champion, the damage was not severe enough to end his race.
Goodyear officials have had a chance to examine the tires that came off of the Joe Gibbs Racing affiliated Toyota cars and according to the tire manufacturer there was nothing wrong with the construction of the tires themselves. Goodyear’s Stu Grant has come to the conclusion that the No. 20, 95 and 19 teams all suffered tire failures due to running tire pressures lower than the recommended settings set by Goodyear.
Originally, Goodyear believed that Jones had run over debris to cause the tire failure but upon further review they decided it was under inflation.
Goodyear has sent the Toyota teams a note to increase the tire pressure on the right front tires of their cars going forward for the remainder of the race.
StarCom Racing’s No. 00 car driven by Landon Cassill has suffered a flat tire early in this race, before ultimately suffering a blown motor. Goodyear has not declared what has happened with the tires on that car, however, StarCom took to Twitter to question the tires that are being used Sunday.
Sounds like whoever does not blow a RF tire will win tonight. Crazy. When is the last time you saw tire failures like this?
— StarCom Racing (@StarcomRacing) May 26, 2019
