"When driving off-highway, the performance of a vehicles tires is influenced by the elements of friction as related to the following items: Adhesion, momentary molecular bonding, deformation and mechanical keying (Haney, 2003). Where a race car operates on a highly tactile surface, which allows wide, even smooth tires to perform exceptionally (due to adhesion and bonding), an off-highway vehicle operates in the exact opposite environment, with minimally tactile surfaces. Rocks, dirt ledges, dusty boulders, highly irregular surfaces, sandy washes, etc. occupy the fourwheeler's environment. Surfaces that do not provide high adhesion rates or momentary bonding. However, these surfaces are highly irregular, which does provide the opportunity to take advantage of mechanical keying and deformation. These traction elements require high contact pressure, coupled with low air pressure to get the tire to flex with the terrain. A wide tire distributes the vehicles weight over too large of a surface, preventing deformation from occurring at the same rate as a narrow tire with the same pressure (force). A narrow tire will hold better than a wide one by keying to the surface aggregate due to the greater vertical force."