How to Choose Track Brake Pads: Compounds, Brands and Fitment

September 7, 2026

Pagid racing brake pads

Third session of the day. You've found some rhythm, you're carrying more speed onto the straight than you were this morning, and you go to the brakes at the same marker you've used all day. The pedal goes soft, travels further than it should, and the car doesn't slow the way you asked it to.

That's brake fade, and it is the single most common reason a first track day ends early. It is also almost entirely a pad problem — street pads are formulated to work from cold in a supermarket car park, and they simply stop making friction at the temperatures a track session generates.

The fix is a pad matched to how you actually drive. Here is how to pick one, and how to find it for your car.

Start With How You Use the Car — Not How Fast It Is

Every compound is a trade between four things: cold bite (does it work on the first corner), peak temperature (how hard can you push before it fades), rotor wear (how fast it eats your discs), and noise and dust (whether you can live with it on the road).

Nothing wins all four. The most aggressive compound is almost always the wrong answer for someone doing two track days a year, because it will be cold, noisy and destructive for the 95% of the time the car spends on the road.

So the honest question is not "what's the best pad" — it's which of those four am I willing to give up.

Street car, occasional track day

You need something that still works on a cold morning commute but survives 20 minutes of abuse. Hawk's HP Plus is the classic answer here — genuinely usable on the road, with far more temperature headroom than an OE pad.

Trade-off: noisier and dustier than stock. Accept that and it's the most versatile pad in the range.

Dedicated HPDE and track day car

Once the car is trailered or you're willing to swap pads at the track, you can move to a proper race compound. This is where most Enzuca customers land, and where the choice actually gets interesting — Hawk DTC-60, Pagid RS42 and the Blue compounds all live here.

Trade-off: poor cold bite. Your out-lap is genuinely longer, and that catches people out.

Wheel-to-wheel and endurance

Maximum torque and consistency deep into a stint, with rotor life treated as a consumable. Hawk DTC-70 and Pagid RS19 are the reference points.

Trade-off: everything else.

The Compounds That Matter, and What Each One Is For

Hawk DTC-60 The track-day sweet spot — high torque, kinder to rotors than DTC-70 from $298.79 Shop on Enzuca →	Hawk DTC-70 Hawk's flagship — maximum bite where the braking zone is where you pass from $451.79 Shop on Enzuca →
Pagid RS42 Blue Bite from the first corner — the sprint and out-lap answer from $324.02 Shop on Enzuca →	Pagid RS19 Yellow The endurance favourite — outstanding wear rate over long stints from $432.87 Shop on Enzuca →

For the full compound-code breakdown — what the letters and numbers on the box actually mean — see Track Brake Pads 101.

Shop by Brand

Each manufacturer has a house character, and drivers tend to develop a preference. All of these are stocked in depth.

Hawk — 578 part numbers, the broadest fitment coverage we carry. DTC-60 and DTC-70 for track, HP Plus for dual-purpose.
Pagid — 170 part numbers. The endurance racer's choice; RS19 and RS42 are the ones to know.
Endless — 108 part numbers. Japanese compounds with a strong following on Subaru and Porsche. See how to choose an Endless compound.
Performance Friction — 59 part numbers, plus the full PFC range.
Brembo Race Technologies — 76 part numbers. Our seven-compound Brembo comparison is the place to start, and which Brembo pad for what covers the same ground by use case.

Find the Pad for Your Car

Compound is only half the decision — the other half is the part number that actually fits your caliper. Brake pads are caliper-specific, not model-specific, so two cars of the same year can take different pads depending on which brake package they left the factory with.

Start in Vehicle Brake Pads, which covers 1,159 fitments, or go straight to your platform:

2022+ Subaru WRX — Brembo calipers, 2024 WRX TR, 2018+ WRX STI
Porsche brakes and rotors and Porsche Endless pads (93 fitments)
BMW brakes and rotors

If you're not sure which caliper you have, send us the year, model and a photo of the caliper and we'll confirm the part number before you order.

Two Things That Will Waste Your New Pads

Old brake fluid

A race pad will happily generate heat that boils street fluid, and boiling fluid produces exactly the soft pedal you bought the pads to avoid. Fresh high-temperature fluid is the cheapest upgrade on this page.

Skipping the bed-in

Every pad needs an initial heat cycle to transfer an even layer of friction material onto the rotor. Skip it and you get uneven deposits, vibration under braking, and a pad that never reaches its rated performance. Our guide to preventing and recovering from brake fade covers the procedure, and changing fluid after every track day explains why the interval is shorter than you think.

Bring a Spare Set

Pads are a consumable, and a full-day event on an aggressive compound can get through more than people expect. Carrying a spare set is the difference between finishing the weekend and watching it from the paddock.

Everything We've Written About Brakes

Choosing a compound

Brand deep-dives

Fade, fluid and consumables

Subaru WRX

The Bottom Line

Be honest about how the car gets used, pick the compound that matches, and accept the trade-off that comes with it. Then get the part number right for your caliper, put fresh fluid in, and bed them properly.

Browse Racing Brakes and Rotors — 348 products across Hawk, Pagid, Endless, Performance Friction and Brembo — or find your fitment in Vehicle Brake Pads.

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