I live on the balmy west coast of Canada.  The land of rain, where a day of snow shuts the community down. I grew up thinking that all we needed were chains for our tires, for those few days when the snow hit, or when would take off to the hills to get in a day of skiing.

Snow tires were unnecessary when you didn’t really get much snow.

So when Bridgestone tires invited me to hang with them in Denver Colorado to learn about Winter Driving and their Blizzak tire I was confused.

We barely HAVE winter on the west coast, so why would I need to learn about winter tires?

Well, unbeknownst to me winter tires should be used as soon as you can see your breath, and that the rubber USED in Winter tires doesn’t harden up under the cold conditions and assists in decreasing your stopping distance when the roads get slippery.

And that is when I suddenly realized that WINTER doesn’t need to mean SNOW.  That cold (under 7’c) and wet is winter enough, and the driving conditions are dangerous enough to require a little assistance.

The clever team at Bridegstone tires went back to the roots when looking to improve their Blizzak tires.  Using Bio-mimiciry they pulled the best from nature into their new design.

The Polar Bear.
Master of the ice walk, winter thriving and snow burrowing beast, and the perfect creature to Bio-Mimic for winter tires.  Their engineers used this bio-mimicry to create a better gripping tire, that has an improved stopping distance on snow and ice.

I didn’t get too close, but I didn’t have to. The point was made.  Stopping distance, sliding distance, starting ability: all of it is important in winter driving and if we can get an improvement on it, we should.

And we got the chance to see it for real.  The team from Bridgestone and The Tire Rack took us to Pepsi Centre Denver to get behind the wheel and put their Blizzak tires to the test.  And as we know, seeing is believing, check out my little video that shows the actual stopping time of a car in All Season Bridgestone tires VS one in Bridgestone Blizzak tires while driving on ICE.

Yah. I know.

Kind of mind-blowing.  We were able to measure our starting and stopping distance in each car and time and time again I was amazed at the difference the winter tires made.  For a gal who didn’t even think winter tires were needed, I can now understand their value.

A huge thanks to the Bridegstone and Tire Rack team for including this little west coaster on their press trip. You opened my mind and taught me a thing or two about Winter, and for that I am grateful.

You can find your Blizzak Winter tires EVERYWHERE just about now!

And if you want to see the CRAZY time we all got up to, check out the Magisto Video below!