TRI-ACE launches off-road and racing tires in U.S. market push

Aftermarket specialist TRI-ACE launched two new tires at the SEMA Show in Las Vegas last week as the company, which is popular in Europe, ramps up its presence in the U.S. market.

The Chinese manufacturer has introduced a new all-terrain tire, Dakar Rally, which has been developed specifically for U.S. off-road conditions by the company’s Japan-based engineering team.

TRI-ACE Tires’ Technical Director Scott Blair said the tire had been doing well in Europe and the U.S. design had been developed together with McNeil Racing.

“They helped us with the design of the angles of the blocks as well as how it actually grabs and bites into the terrain we have here and keeps itself clean, obviously providing better traction throughout the whole range (of terrain), whether it’s rocks, sand or mud,” he said.

Not just smokin’ hot, smokin’ color

The other new tire seen for the first time in the U.S. at SEMA is the Racing King, which Blair called a “radical” tire aimed at the growing U.S drifting community. Perhaps the tire’s most “radical” feature is the fact it can smoke in up to four different colors.

“It has already been doing extremely well in Europe and we’re now bringing it here to the U.S.,” Blair said.

“We have the capability of building that tire in three different types of rubber compounds and providing up to four different colors of smoke that are available once the wheel begins to spin.

“What people have to understand is when you build a tire that does that, you’re having to overcome centrifugal force, incredible amounts of heat, being able to maintain a phenomenal amount of grip while these cars are being thrown into controlled chaos.

“To be able to do that is much more than just putting on the brakes and sliding the car around. These cars many times are doing 30 or 40 miles an hour, but they’re doing it at full throttle and going from a hard left to a hard right and clearly all inches away from concrete barriers.”

Australian drift champion, Josh Robinson, and TRI-ACE U.S. national sales manager, Jack Bidding, at the SEMA launch of TRI-ACE’s new tires into the U.S. market.

TRI-ACE develops a U.S. distribution network

Blair said TRI-ACE is developing partnerships with professional drift associations.

He said TRI-ACE is creating a distribution network across America including with specialized dealers who work exclusively with lifted and ultra-high-performance vehicles. By the time winter thaws, the tires will be available for consumers.

“We will be putting these tires in inventory in our U.S.-based warehouses going into first quarter of next year, and from that central distribution point they will start migrating out to our more regional distributors so our consumers who are looking for this product will be able to access it locally,” he said.

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TRI-ACE launches off-road and racing tires in U.S.