Winter Tires in Rain on Track???
 

Hi all,

It's scheduled to rain at the track (Mosport in Bowmanville, ON) tomorrow and I am debating whether or not to keep my winter tires on for it or to put on my summer tires. My winters grip way better than my summers in the rain on the street but I'm nervous about taking them to the track simply because I don't know if they're designed to handle the speed/g-force, and I've because I've never seen anyone do it before.

The temp will be 13-17 degrees Celsius for the time I'm there.

I couldn't find any threads on this, so any thoughts are appreciated.

Cheers

I mean they'll be fine...

Winter tires are a compound that is more fluid at a lower temperature than summer tires. They'll generally have more grip under any condition. The downside is that tire wear is significantly accelerated when a tire is used at a temperature higher than it's target.

Tracking a winter tire in the "heat" could be the difference from it lasting another season of road use or being trash now.

If it's that cool and actually raining while you are on track, then I doubt you'll have a problem wearing your snow tires out very quickly.

However, if the track dries out, you'll probably wear them down (or start chunking) them pretty quickly.

Thanks a lot guys. I'll keep an eye on the weather tomorrow and see how wet it gets.

What make/models are the winters and the summer tires? Unless your summee tires are slicks, I think you should still use them. Winter tires are treaded for traction on loose surfaces like snow and mud. The blocks are huge and squirmy and the water sipes are usually not made for high speed water displacement.

Plus I don't know how the winter sidewalls will handle Mosport's high speed corners.

If it's actually raining then those high-speed corners won't be high-speed anymore.

while they will be better at a lower (near freezing) temperatures, other than in those specific conditions, a summer tire (not worn bald) will have more wet grip than winter tires... If the summers are bald, then yeah, that's an issue, but short of the summers being bald and it being near freezing temperatures, I would go with the summers.

I actually keep a set of Michelin Pilot Super Sports specifically for if it's going to be raining while I'm at the track... they are awesome in the rain!

The sun ended up coming out in the end so I switched to my summer tires-they aren't bald and after reading what you guys said I think I should have run them anyway. They are the Pirelli P-Zeros that came with the car. I can get another season out of my winters so I will stick with the Pirellis next rain day or invest in a new set of tires with a bit more tread so that I can avoid eating my winters prematurely. I think it will be time for me to buy a set of track tires soon...

Thanks a lot for everyone's help :beer05: