The Yokohama Rubber Co., Ltd., have recently announced that its US subsidiary Yokohama Tire Corporation (YTC) will supply ADVAN racing tires as the control tire for the new Mustang Cup series sanctioned by United States Auto Club (USAC). The series will be held in the United States from April 2025. YTC will supply ADVAN A005 tires for dry conditions and ADVAN A006 tires for wet conditions.
The Mustang Cup is a new series of entry-level races for amateur racing enthusiasts and novice racers being launched by Ford Performance, the Ford Motor Company’s racing division. The Mustang Cup series will provide participants with an opportunity to hone their racing skills and offer advancement into Mustang Challenge, Mustang GT4* and the higher-level Mustang GT3*. Mustang Cup series will feature Mustang Dark Horse R, which is engineered for competition by Ford Performance. The series will include six races held in six U.S. states, with the inaugural race to be held in Louisiana.
Mustang Cup site: https://performance.ford.com/motorsport/mustang-cup
* Not a race name, but a reference to classes of racing cars competing in more advanced racing series.
Yokohama Rubber will build a strong motorsports relationship with Ford Performance in 2025. In addition to supplying the control tire for the Mustang Cup, Yokohama Rubber will join Ford Performance in supporting German racing team Haupt Racing Team’s Ford Mustang GT3 cars in the Nürburgring 24-Hour Race (ADAC RAVENOL 24h Nürburgring), one of the world's top endurance races. This will be the first time since 2012 that Yokohama Rubber and Ford Performance have collaborated in the Nürburgring 24-Hour Race, and the first time that Ford Performance has participated in the race since 2019.
Yokohama Rubber is using its support for premium sports car one-make racing series to raise awareness and strengthen the brand power of its ADVAN tires in the North American market. In addition to the new Mustang Cup series, Yokohama Rubber is supplying its ADVAN racing tires to several other one-make racing series, including the Porsche Carrera Cup North America, which is widely considered to be one of the world’s fastest one-make races.
The consumer tire strategy in Yokohama Rubber’s three-year (2024–2026) medium-term management plan, Yokohama Transformation 2026 (YX2026), aims to maximize the sales ratios of high-value-added tires by expanding sales of YOKOHAMA’s global flagship ADVAN brand, the GEOLANDAR brand of tires for SUVs and pickup trucks, winter tires, and 18-inch and larger tires. Yokohama Rubber positions participation in motorsports activities as crucial to its effort to further strengthen the ADVAN and GEOLANDAR brands. Yokohama Rubber therefore is again participating in a wide variety of motorsports events around the globe, from top-category to grassroots events.
