I was at the local racetrack, doing some laps on a sunny/hot track day...
third session out... 3rd lap on the main straight, flat out at 194km/h according to telemetry.... and the 500km-old front right tire, a pirelli p-zero, decided to delaminate in spectacular fashion (punched thru a corner of the quarter panel).
what baffles me is, I had the 4 tires pulled from the car and balanced the night before. I even inspected them personally and found them perfect. fronts were 500km olds pzeros, rears were brand new michelin pilot sports 4...
seriously, never been more scared in my entire life, than when i heard the noise, saw pieces flying and felt the steering wheel completely unweighted for a few miliseconds...
the entire tread was gone, fortunately it happened on a straight before the braking point... and I had enough time to lift off the gas and coast to a stop.
i really had not clue it was only a blowout at the time. Because of the noise (and being fairly new tires, and the pieces i saw flying away) i thought i had have clipped something and the entire wheel/hub was gone).
going back... am reaaally grateful it happened on the straight... had it been 500 yards before (in a middle of a 70mph left hander) and it would have hurt a whole lot more.... same if it had happened 100 yards in front, in the middle a 130-60mph braking zone...
i keep thinking about it, and I remember the car pulling hard to the right, and a mushy feeling in fast left handers (the tire was probably starting to delaminate there)... which i thought was just the tires getting greasy/hot; but the important thing is, I was very lucky and nothing more serious happened.
now, the time has come for a decision.
my c63 is way too fast for its own good... specially for a car without a roll cage on a race track, doing 80mph average lap times... its also very hard on tires (NEVER buying p-zeros again, am a michelin pilot sport /super sport convert now); am seriously thinking about giving up on fast cars and track days.... maybe get a beater with a proper roll cage, or a set of wheels with proper track tires (my street tires get pounded on pothole infested roads, which might have contributed to this); or forget about cars all together and start cycling back up again....
third session out... 3rd lap on the main straight, flat out at 194km/h according to telemetry.... and the 500km-old front right tire, a pirelli p-zero, decided to delaminate in spectacular fashion (punched thru a corner of the quarter panel).
what baffles me is, I had the 4 tires pulled from the car and balanced the night before. I even inspected them personally and found them perfect. fronts were 500km olds pzeros, rears were brand new michelin pilot sports 4...
seriously, never been more scared in my entire life, than when i heard the noise, saw pieces flying and felt the steering wheel completely unweighted for a few miliseconds...
the entire tread was gone, fortunately it happened on a straight before the braking point... and I had enough time to lift off the gas and coast to a stop.
i really had not clue it was only a blowout at the time. Because of the noise (and being fairly new tires, and the pieces i saw flying away) i thought i had have clipped something and the entire wheel/hub was gone).
going back... am reaaally grateful it happened on the straight... had it been 500 yards before (in a middle of a 70mph left hander) and it would have hurt a whole lot more.... same if it had happened 100 yards in front, in the middle a 130-60mph braking zone...
i keep thinking about it, and I remember the car pulling hard to the right, and a mushy feeling in fast left handers (the tire was probably starting to delaminate there)... which i thought was just the tires getting greasy/hot; but the important thing is, I was very lucky and nothing more serious happened.
now, the time has come for a decision.
my c63 is way too fast for its own good... specially for a car without a roll cage on a race track, doing 80mph average lap times... its also very hard on tires (NEVER buying p-zeros again, am a michelin pilot sport /super sport convert now); am seriously thinking about giving up on fast cars and track days.... maybe get a beater with a proper roll cage, or a set of wheels with proper track tires (my street tires get pounded on pothole infested roads, which might have contributed to this); or forget about cars all together and start cycling back up again....
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