Taking it to The Streets: Hoosier Debuts New Track Attack Pro Tire

It has been a long time since Hoosier Racing Tire announced anything resembling a street tire. To date, Hoosier has only ever offered three street tires, including the new 200 UTQG Track Attack Pro, which debuted mid-September.

The other two street offerings are so highly specialized that they are not widely known, but the new Track Attack Pro looks poised to create a big footprint in the street performance, track day and even racing markets.

The Hoosier Track Attack Pro was designed to bridge the gap between a high-performance tire that is completely legal for the street use, such as Hoosier parent company Continental’s ExtremeContact Force model, and the Hoosier R7 racing tire, and ultimately the Hoosier Circuit Slick. The Track Attack Pro is aimed directly at drivers who demand a track-only type of tire while still being able to use it on the street. Where the tire ends up being used most will be for the market to decide, but Hoosier designed it to be versatile.

“It’s not just a one-trick pony. It’s not just a track tire. It’s not just a street tire. It’s for people that maybe just do track days,” said Hoosier representative Marc Sanzenbacher. “But it’s also equally suited for somebody that just does weekend fun runs. Maybe you’ve got a Porsche GT3 that you take to cars and coffee and drive through the canyons on the weekend, and that’s all you do with it. It’s perfectly fine for that as well, an excellent tire, even for your daily commute.”

To give you a better idea of this tire’s intent, its key competitors include the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R, the Yokohama Advan A052, Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar 3R, the Bridgestone Potenza RE-71RS and the Pirelli P Zero Trofeo R.

It is important to highlight some of the design features that allow the tire to deliver the levels of performance that it does. The first of which is the extra-wide shoulder rib that maximizes cornering performance. This is an extreme-performance summer tire designed to deliver “addictive levels of responsiveness and handling.” Those shoulder ribs also have wear indicators to let the user know when the tires are approaching the end of their service life.

The tire also features Hoosier’s featherlight construction for excellent responsiveness. Hoosier said the Track Attack Pro is 7 to 24 percent lighter than competing tires, which equates to 2 to 6 pounds at each corner, depending on size. That reduces unsprung weight.

Grip is enhanced by the three-rib circumferential pattern with a minimal lateral voids to increase tread pattern stiffness, which is within 10 percent of the R7. The optimized center rib is designed to enhance braking performance, and tread depth is a precise 5.3/32 of an inch. Yes, 5 point 3. The Track Attack Pro also is built with a motorsports-derived compound, a subject in which Hoosier has considerable expertise.

The Track Attack Pro is an asymmetric tread pattern with a 200 UTQG tread wear, an A temperature and a traction rating and in speed ratings from B to bracket Y with standard load and extra load options.

“With our simulations, we figured out that with the target void concept, we reduced the stiffness comparing to slick, but we still were able to reduce the void comparing to other tires by roughly 25 percent,” said Gabriel Stariak, Hoosier head of product development. “When we designed that pattern, we had to run 11 different orientations to figure out what would be the right concept. What you see here is the final one. The angle (of the voids) is the same, but the distance is a little bit different. Now with that, we were able to reduce the noise and also we were able to reduce chance to have irregular wear and reduce the chance to have potential cracks in case we would go with a little bit stiffer compounds.”

The company said it went through more than 50 different constructions of the tire to arrive at the finished product. To help launch it, Hoosier invited a coterie of journalists and influencers to the BMW Performance Driving School at the Thermal Club just south of Palm Springs, Calif., to put the new tire through its paces. The company outfitted 2-, 3- and 4-series BMW M cars with its new Track Attack Pro and competing tires mentioned above.

We took on five exercises in the cars on various tires. First was a timed autocross-style slalom course in an M2 on the Track Attack Pro and the Bridgestone RE-71RS. The second was an avoidance maneuver under full antilock braking in an M3 on the Hoosier and the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R. Third was a lead-follow session on the Track Attack Pro on the original Thermal track in an M4, and fourth was a handling module, which could best be described as driving an M3 on a kart track on the Hoosier, Yokohama Advan A052 and the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R. The final enchilada was driving a factory-built M4 GT4 car on the Thermal track on the Hoosier Track Attack Pro.

Some of the exercises were more telling than others. The one I got the least out of was the slalom for a couple of reasons. One, it has been years since I really attacked a slalom autocross course, so I was a bit rusty and the M2 was a new platform to me. Two, it was the first test of the day and the cars all had sticker tires on them, so they weren’t up to temp on the first runs and tire labels always diminish grip until they have been worn off.

That said, I did manage to run my fastest time on the Hoosiers, even with the added weight of a Hoosier rep in the car. It also was my best driving effort in that test, but once I and the tires warmed up, I could feel the turn-in grip that Hoosier had been touting in its presentations.

For the next exercise, we did a lead-follow in a road-going M4 with BMW driving instructors on the Thermal track. The track does not have any high-speed turns. It’s essentially two hairpins, a chicane with two double-apex carousels and a right-left transition onto the front straight. Fun and interesting, sure, but not a fast track.

Still, if there were ever a corner in which to induce understeer, it is a hairpin. By applying throttle earlier than called for, or by going in a bit too hot, a driver can induce understeer. So, that’s what I did.

The grip at turn-in that I felt on the slalom course was still present in abundance on the Thermal track. I could induce understeer, but it wasn’t easy due to the tire’s turn-in grip. I could dial it back out by reducing throttle or entry speed. Because of the grip, I also could add in more steering input midcorner in the carousel turns, which was handy. I’m told the M4’s electric power steering is a bit numb, but I could sense what the front tires were doing through the steering wheel. My estimation is that was likely due to the lightweight construction that Hoosier talked about.

“The two outer shoulder ribs are designed with a focus on a semi-slick type product, with an ultra-low void concept that provide excellent cornering performance,” Sanzenbacher said.

From there we went to the braking/avoidance maneuver. Here we were told to bring the car up to 50 mph, then enter a gate of two cones that led to a lane change. We were instructed to stand on the brakes hard and get into full ABS mode once we entered the gate and then change lanes and bring the car to a stop.

Given the space provided, it didn’t look as though the car would do what they were asking of it, so the instructor demonstrated the move for us twice. Then it was our turn.

We ran the test in a car outfitted with the Track Attack Pro and Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R. In drill after drill, the Track Attack Pro stopped shorter and offered better turn-in. This drill was especially telling because of the blended inputs of braking and turning, and the difference between the two tires was distinct.

From there we headed over to the handling module, essentially driving M3s on a kart track. This test had three tires on the cars, the Hoosier, Michelin and Yokohama. There were five cars and five test drivers and we jumped in and out of all of them.

We were able to get the tires plenty warm, more so than the other two drills, and here again, it was easier to induce understeer from the Michelin and the Yokohama. It is usually helpful and instructional for journalists to be skeptical of a manufacturers’ claims, but here again, the Track Attack Pro had better turn-in grip than the other two. In fact, I expected more from Michelin based on its reputation — and maybe its price point — but I liked it the least of all three, with the Hoosier coming out on top and the Yokohama in the middle.

At that point we suited up to drive the M4 GT4 on the Thermal track. Of course I was giddy to drive this thing, even if it was tuned to its lowest setting. After all, how many people on earth get to drive a new factory-built GT4 car? Believe it or not, the racecar was easier to drive than the road-going M4.

Yes, the racecar had aero, but because of the low-speed nature of the turns at Thermal, it wasn’t really a factor. Here again, turn-in grip was exceptional, but because this was a racecar, trying to get it to understeer was more difficult. When you added throttle at the apex or sooner, the stability control kicked when the rear end wanted to step out. Coming in hot didn’t work too well, either. The thing just stuck and went where you pointed it, and the exercise was over all too soon.

“Obviously, the Hoosier R7 is an industry benchmark in regard to dry handling. Dry braking and steering response are considered one of the best, and lap times are fairly unchallenged in that segment at the expense of tread life,” Sanzenbacher said. “Of course we’re happy to report with the Track Attack Pro, we’ve almost equaled the dry handling, dry braking and steering response of the existing R7, with only a small reduction in lap times, but with an increase in tread life relative to the R7.”

The spider graphs that Hoosier presented in comparison seemed to bear that out and align with our findings on track. The increase in tread life doesn’t appear to be all that significant. I would like to have seen more lifespan, but we are all aware of the tradeoffs that would entail, and the tire’s performance would not have been as good.

“So, the big questions is, how much does it cost, right? That’s always a factor,” Sanzenbacher said. “When we look at all of our sizes and we do a weighted average, the Hoosier Track Attack Pro represents a 100 percent from a price point. When we compare that to the Pirelli Trofeo R, we’re 25 percent lower than that tire. We compare that to the Michelin, we’re 18 percent lower than that tire. And when we look at the Yokohama Advan, we’re within 2 percent.  With the Goodyear, we’re within 2 percent and within 8 percent of the Bridgestone RE-71RS. So, it’s a very price-competitive tire relative to everything that’s in the market at a performance level that none of the tires can match.”

Ultimately Hoosier will offer 46 sizes of the Track Attack Pro in rim diameters from 15 to 21 inches and aspect ratios 25 to 50. Eight sizes are available right now. Another six sizes are queued up for early Q4 2024, with another 13 sizes also coming later in Q4. In Q2 of 2025, Hoosier will introduce another four sizes, followed by six more in Q3 2025 and nine more sizes in Q4 2025.