Dunlop Tires suffered a major PR disaster when several riders at the North West 200 road races in Northern Ireland suffered catastrophic delamination of their rear tyre at high speeds. Now, you can see what it looked like when it happened!

The Irish and the Isle of Man road races are some of the most dangerous races anywhere in the world: racing on public roads, there are literally thousands of roadside obstacles whose presence mean that any crash is not likely to end well for the rider.

With that in mind, mechanical failure is not something to contemplate although, usually, all that entails is an ignominious grind to a halt. But contemplating a tire failure is guaranteed to give even the most hardened racer a sleepless night. With so little margin for error, anything that can spear you off into the scenery is to be avoided..!

That’s what makes the spate of tire failures suffered by Dunlop users at the North West 200 races in Northern Ireland all the more frightening. One was caught on camera by a spectator and shows the rear tyre of Michael Dunlop delaminating as he is travelling at well over 150mph along a suburban street. The fact that he managed to avoid injury is as much down to providence as to his skill.

He wasn’t the only rider to be affected: Peter Hickman, another road racing star, also suffered a similar blow-out, also thankfully without injury. This prompted Dunlop to withdraw all its products from the rest of the weekend’s racing, which meant that a lot of the big names weren’t able to compete any further.

With the Isle of Man TT just a couple of weeks away, Dunlop will really have to pull their collective fingers out if they are to compete there safely. If they will be able to do that is certain: they’ve been in the game for too long to not be able to respond to such a situation.

Hickman was clear in his trust for Dunlop:

"Despite the obvious tire malfunction that I had at 197mph in Saturday’s first SBK race, I have 100% faith in Dunlop and their brand.

“I have been racing on their products for many years, of course, something has gone wrong somewhere, but they will rectify it.

“I’m just thankful that myself and the other riders all walked away completely unscathed.”

I love the nonchalance he mentions that he was doing 197mph when his tire failed! If that was me, I wouldn’t be able to speak for about a week afterwards and, even then, only in a hoarse whisper with a large brandy close to hand.&

Text by Harry Fisher for topspeed

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