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Tire Pressure Setup

Hot target in, cold setting out. The paddock ritual everyone half-guesses, replaced by a number you can set with a gauge in the morning and verify after lap three.

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Cold from hot · v1.0

Run once per axle
What the tire should read fully worked, mid-session.
1.80bar · cold setting
  • Expected rise0.40 bar
  • Same in psi26.1 psi cold
  • Verifyhot, after lap 3

Rule-of-thumb model from typical track-day rises. Your tire and driving are the final authority — measure hot and correct.

Why cold pressure is the wrong number to copy

Tires only care about hot pressure. Grip, wear pattern and carcass stability are all set by the pressure at working temperature — but the only pressure you can conveniently set is the cold one, in the paddock, before anything is warm. The whole trick of a track morning is subtracting the expected rise correctly.

That rise is not a constant. A gentle road drive adds a couple of tenths of a bar; twenty hard minutes on track adds half a bar or more, and a cold morning adds more still because you start further from working temperature. Copying a friend's cold pressures without copying their session and weather is how outside shoulders get eaten.

Typical rises

SessionTypical riseIn psi
Motorway cruise+0.10–0.20 bar+1.5–3
Spirited road drive+0.20–0.30 bar+3–4.5
Track, 15–20 min+0.35–0.45 bar+5–6.5
Track, long / aggressive+0.50–0.60 bar+7–9
Tab.01 — typical pressure rises for street-based tires

FAQ

Most street and track-day tires work around 2.1–2.4 bar hot; many manufacturers publish a track figure for specific models. When in doubt, start from the road placard pressure as a hot target and adjust from wear and feel.

Typically 0.3–0.6 bar (4–8 psi) over a 15–25 minute session, depending on driving, tire and ambient temperature. Cooler days produce bigger rises.

The rise stabilizes once the carcass reaches working temperature, around lap 3–4. A quick hot check tells you whether the cold setting was right and becomes your personal correction for next time.