West Coast US Conti Racing Tyre Distribution Handed to Superbike

Seeking to establish the name in the USA, Continental has awarded exclusive West Coast, Hawaii and Alaska distribution rights of its racing motorcycle tyres to California-based dealer, Superbike Tires.

Mark Duncan, owner of Superbike Tires commented, “We are extremely pleased with the way that the Continental organization has handled our needs in getting us set up as new distributors. Our mandate at Superbike Tires is to not only provide world class tyres for both competition and track day use, but to also set the high water mark for customer service, in stock availability, great pricing and ‘after the sale’ support. We stock ContiRaceAttack Competition DOT race and Racing Slick tyres in all compounds and the Rain tyres are also now available. We sell Conti and we support you on and off the track and online!”

He added that initial testing on the tyres had revealed many positives to the distributor: “we found that after a session or two, the test riders were easily able to come to grips with the new contour of the tyre surface. We knew the tyres would have excellent grip characteristics but we were all surprised by their endurance. From a Suzuki SV650 up through a Suzuki Hayabusa, the Contis have held up and have held up well. As a matter of fact, all the test bikes were running medium compound rears except for one ZX10R that was on the Conti ‘Endurance’ rear. Not only are these tyres already priced right, but my ownership in The Track Club, our track day organization (www.thetrackclub.com) it allows us to offer incentives and packages to our customers that no other tyre brand or track day company will be able to match.”

Continental provides multiple choices of compounds (soft / medium / endurance) and sizing in their Conti RaceAttack series of competition tyres, including race slicks, DOT’s race and rain tyres. Continental has developed ‘Continuous-Compound Technology’ where a single compound, ‘Black Chili’, is cured through a new temperature controlled process to deliver the benefits of a multi-compound tyre without the abrupt transitions between the varying compounds. This ‘intuitive’ approach to altering the characteristic of the tyre means there are no seams to tip through as the tyre rolls from the harder center to the softer sides.

Superbike Tires plans to distribute its product online through www.superbiktires.net from a warehouse in San Jose, and through ‘sub-distributors’ dotted around its territory. Duncan adds: “Because we realize the immediacy of racing, we have plans in place to establish a number of sub-distributors around our region who will then stock their own quantity of Continental race tyres for both racing and the multitude of track days around the region. This allows us to react more quickly to demand and get you out on the track where you want to be. We will guide these sub-distributors in all things Conti to insure that service and support of the brand is the same no matter where in our territory you purchase them.”

Superbike Tires has packaged their race tyres at a price that will allow the user to run Continental at a significant savings over all the other brands, Continental NA is also offering racing contingencies in all club racing organizations in 2009 and will continue to do so through 2010 and beyond. Trackside service at these events is imminent as Superbike Tires is establishing trackside tyre vendors.