A team might even have a tire guy or two. And don't forget the gas man. What we do is tailor our shocks to our needs. While a street car may change shocks after tens of thousands of miles, a race car may essentially change shocks every few laps during practice for a race like Sunday's Daytona 500. Contrary to conventional wisdom that just has shocks acting as devices to protect a car from blows created by holes, ripples or bumps in the road, shocks also work to keep a vehicle's tire on the road surface below it.
Traction is important to movement and braking.
In a moment by moment demonstration of physicist's Sir Isaac Newton's three Laws of Motion, shock specialists speak in terms of the forces being distributed to tires under ever-changing conditions. The change rate for the car won't be consistent throughout the corner. As you get more travel or less travel, you might be tighter or looser. Put another way, while lapping Daytona International Speedway, Terry Labonte has a preferred line which may be high, low, in the middle or a combination. We use several different valves, check balls, gas pressure and fluid types in a shock to maintain the best grip and the forces we want to create.