The fall of the Goodyear tires at Bristol this past Sunday has indeed brought a fallout. This has left the rumor mill whirring, in the face of an extensive 6-decade-long partnership between the “tire and rubber” manufacturing giants, and the iconic asphalt, (or shall we say concrete) of NASCAR’s short-track evolution.

Currently, four of the active 30 tracks have been constructed with concrete at some capacity, and two of those are under a mile, namely Martinsville Speedway, and the star of the hour – Bristol Motor Speedway. The other five short tracks are all made with asphalt, just like Dale Earnhardt Jr’s recently repaved and tested 0.625-mile sweetheart, the iconic North Wilkesboro Speedway, owned by SMI. Therefore, Junior was proud when he compared the repaved-on-concrete Bristol with the returning venue of this year’s All-Star race, on the latest episode of Dirty Mo Media podcast – Door Bumper Clear.

Racing Legend Turned “Advocate for Asphalt” – Dale Earnhardt Jr

This past Sunday’s Bristol race saw the majority of the cautions take place amidst conversation on the new “resin” substitute placed across the “lower groove” at “The Last Great Colosseum” emerging as one of the primary reasons for the trials of tireless tire management, courtesy of Goodyear. One more problem that has been plaguing the concrete setups of tracks like Dover or Martinsville, has been the “cheese grater” style friction wearing off the tires, due to the abrasive texture associated with concrete. Dale Jr explained exactly this when he told spotters Brett Griffin, Freddie Kraft, TJ Majors, and co-hosts for the day 23XI Racing’s Tyler Reddick, and Casey Boat when discussing the Bristol changes.

“I would not be as nervous about taking this tire to Richmond yeah for sure. The asphalt, you know, wears the tire differently than concrete. That brushed concrete is a bit of a grater, you know, bit of a cheese grater… Dover and Bristol…” 

Kraft came in to ask NASCAR’s most popular icon in a cheeky inquisition: “Is this your pitch to get asphalt back at Bristol or never gonna happen?” To which Junior declined straight away, without any hesitation. What he said next exemplified his relatable personality with the perfect response. The Intimidator’s son blatantly declared — “Concrete’s for Sidewalks man.”

He also explained, however, that the concrete switch has been the reason for the quickly deteriorating nature of asphalt under high speeds, if not allowed the time to settle. This would be a bad idea for the recently repaved-in-concrete Bristol gearing up for the 5th race of the season.

Outlining a recently viewed example on YouTube, Dale Jr continued, “I think those races are on YouTube, but there was a particular weekend where they had just recently repaved the racetrack and it was tearing apart, awful. And they said we’re just going to put concrete down. They’ve never had a problem since… Is today’s asphalt technology better? Sure. Would it probably last? I don’t know…”

“But, we’re about to find out with North Wilkesboro… when we go run that All-Star Race.” Dale Jr concluded to the amusement of the room.

The Tire Test on North Wilkesboro

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The testing on the new tires at North Wilkesboro took place recently. All three manufacturers were respectably represented by Joey Logano, Ty Gibbs, and William Byron. After the test, the drivers had mostly good things to say about Dale Jr’s restoration efforts, with the help of the state of North Carolina and NASCAR. Junior provided his own expert observations from the test session. “Two seconds faster. Two and a half seconds, Two and a half in the truck,” compared the Kannapolis, N.C. native.

He then pointed to the only active driver in the room, Reddick, asking him if he had done “the test?” JGR’s Ty Gibbs was the only representative for Toyota and thus Reddick clarified. The #54 Toyota driver had plenty of positive conclusions to draw for the track, prior to a bid at winning his first All-Star race there in May, entering just his second year in the NASCAR Cup Series with his grandfather’s gloried organization.

The Chevrolet contender, William Byron had some interesting comments to make, however, while comparing the repaved NWS to the aforementioned Richmond. He had told the media that “it would probably be a lot like Richmond was when they repaved it, so I don’t know, I vividly have seen some of those races and I feel like it was pretty treacherous, a lot of guys would get in crashes or there would be a lot of restart wrecks,” 

Regardless, all of this is speculation and the “true” test will come to pass, when the Chevys, Toyotas, and the Fords hit the iconic “Moonshine Capital of the World.” Will it make Dale Jr proud for the second year running?

How Dale Earnhardt Jr Was Instrumental in Revamping the North Wilkesboro Speedway