{"id":513469,"date":"2026-03-04T09:37:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:37:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/513469\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T09:37:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:37:16","slug":"would-not-run-without-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/513469\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Would not run without one’"},"content":{"rendered":"

The topic of cool suits has been a major talking point coming out of Sunday\u2019s NASCAR<\/a> Cup Series race at COTA. Multiple systems designed to keep drivers cool inside the race car failed during the race. <\/p>\n

Most notably, AJ Allmendinger\u2018s failed and on a hot day in Austin, he collapsed on pit road and was stretchered to the infield care center. Cool suit malfunctions have become more commonplace of late in NASCAR. But when they work, they are quite effective, Dale Earnhardt Jr. said Tuesday. If Earnhardt were still racing today, he wouldn\u2019t go one race without one unless temperatures were in the 60s and below. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Chillout is wildly effective,\u201d Earnhardt said on Ask Jr. Live<\/a>. \u201cI raced forever with a little shell fan in my helmet, we didn\u2019t have any cool vests, and you were not comfortable but it was what it was. Then we got little cool boxes that blew cool air in the helmet and that was just a little better, not a lot. This box in the car and it\u2019s doing all it can to get the air instead of 120 degrees, it\u2019s making the air maybe 95 or 90 degrees. <\/p>\n

\u201cThen we got these cool vests. I would say the cool vest is about a 40-degree difference in your core temperature body. So, the cool vest basically is all in your torso. It\u2019s not your sleeves, shoulder, it\u2019s basically from your chest down to your belly and in your back. As soon as you turn it on, it\u2019s cold. It is cool. When it\u2019s working as designed, it\u2019s a massive difference. If I raced in the Xfinity or Cup level, I would not run without one unless it was maybe 60 degrees outside. A really cool day, maybe I wouldn\u2019t run one.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is causing cool suits to malfunction?<\/p>\n

Not every driver wears a cool suit. Denny Hamlin\u00a0doesn\u2019t, and he explained on \u201cActions Detrimental<\/a>\u201d what he\u00a0believes is causing the cool suit failures<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cOnce the car goes to caution, all the heat gets trapped inside because you\u2019re not cutting through the air,\u201d Hamlin said. \u201cYou\u2019re not having the air push that hot air. It\u2019s like having a fan on an ice cube. You\u2019re driving, it\u2019s blowing and that gives your cool air. Well once you go caution, your car stops going fast, you shut the fan off. Then you don\u2019t have that cube pushing air onto you anymore. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn the hot sense, right, the car just gets really, really hot during cautions. And I think that\u2019s when these cool units are failing. They\u2019re getting overheated and tripping, and that\u2019s when they\u2019re out for the count.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for potential solutions to the cool suit issue, Hamlin mostly came up empty. Part of the problem is NASCAR is very particular about air flow issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d Hamlin said. \u201cI know that NASCAR\u2019s very, very strict with these teams on restricting airflow to the drivers and their cool units. \u2026 All I know is that NASCAR really frowns upon diverting any air that should be going to the driver.\u201d<\/p>\n

On3\u2019s Thomas Goldkamp contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The topic of cool suits has been a major talking point coming out of Sunday\u2019s NASCAR Cup Series…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":513470,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":["post-513469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nascar","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=513469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513469\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/513470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=513469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=513469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=513469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}