Best Brake Pads for Street and Track
The Best Street-to-Track Pads
Ali Arsham is a driver on the United States Touring Car Championship (USTCC) for the GoGoGear Racing Team. In 2019, the team decided to build a track-day 2011 Mazda MX5. Due to budget issues, the team could not afford a big brake kit. They turned to Raybestos for help.
We recommended our Street Performance brake pads. In this article, we will hear from Ali Arsham himself as he describes how Raybestos Performance brakes stood up under track racing conditions.
Performance Brake Pads: A Street-to-Track Success Story
Raybestos Brakes has been around since 1902. Cars have changed a lot since then and so has Raybestos. Most people associate Raybestos as a manufacturer of street brake parts. What people don’t know is that they have a fantastic racing and performance brake pad division.
When we decided to build a track day 2011 Mazda MX5, we looked for brake pads that were affordable and long-lasting. They also had to endure the demanding challenges of braking at racing speeds. Our clients would be driving the car, and we did not have the budget to put a big brake kit on the car. The car had to work well with stock rotors and calipers.
Raybestos recommended their Street Performance brake pads. They promised excellent performance under extreme conditions, while still operating with low noise. What was even better is that their price was about half of the cheapest race pad. Our team already uses Raybestos Professional brake pads on our other vehicles. Knowing our comfort with Raybestos, we decided to give the Performance friction a shot.
We headed off to Laguna Seca Raceway, a track known for being very hard on brakes. I have driven high-performance street cars at Laguna Seca that would cook their brakes after two laps.
We installed the pads on the Mazda while the car owner watched with a reluctant look. He kept looking at the box. He asked if I realized that these were street pads and insisted that they would not work. I told him that the Raybestos engineers know what they are talking about.
After bedding in the new pads, we sent him on the track to test the car. After driving the car as hard as he could for twenty minutes, he returned and was amazed that they held up.
The car went on to complete many track days with Raybestos Performance pads with lots of different drivers. We saw no issues with the brake pads. What was even more amazing is that the pads lasted a long time. The only negative we saw was that there was a lot of brake dust on the wheels after a hard day at the track.
After seeing the performance of the Raybestos Street Performance pads first hand, I decided to buy a set for my own street car. These pads seem to work well at temperatures as low as 400F and all the way to 800F and above. And of course, the price is right.
Buy Performance Brake Parts
Raybestos offers our full line of Raybestos Street Performance brake pads directly to you for purchase through our website. You can start shopping now by clicking the button below.
