Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to drive a car very fast, esp. when accelerating from a standing start [the smoking tyres that accompany acceleration].

1919		News Scimitar (Memphis,m TN) 27 Sept. 18/3: The best dirt track drivers in the country will burn rubber on the Tri-State course.
1921		Arizona Republican (Phoenix, AZ) 16 Feb. 9/2: Next Sunday the bike riders will grind the old wheels [...] and the gas buggies will burn the rubber.
1937		C. Himes ‘The Night’s for Crying‘ in Coll. Stories (1990) 132: The green sedan burnt rubber, pulled right through the red light in a whining, driving first.
1949–51		in M. Daly Profile of Youth 49: Starting in low gear with a speed of fifty or more miles per hour is known as ‘getting rubber’.
1958		C. Himes Real Cool Killers (1969) 12: A car coming fast down from 127th Street burnt rubber in an earsplitting shriek to keep from running him down.
1966		Current Sl. I:2 3/1: Get rubber, v. To start a car at such a high speed that patch marks are left in the street.
1968		T. Wolfe Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (1969) 278: Someone panicked, got in his car and drove away, burning rubber.
1970		T. Southern Blue Movie (1974) 188: Lips [...] was indeed driving as though from a Hollywood bank robbery, burning rubber on every curve.
1978		R. De Christoforo Grease 48: Finn tore rubber getting out of there.
1981		E. Bunker Little Boy Blue (1995) 282: The car was burning rubber.
1983		C. Heath A-Team 2 (1984) 47: Screeching rubber as he jockeyed the van through traffic.
1992		J. Mowry Way Past Cool 271: Deek smoked rubber, peeling away fast.
1994		N. McCall Makes Me Wanna Holler (1995) 80: Shell Shock burned rubber out of there.
2001		C. Brookmyre A Big Boy Did It and Ran Away 8: You could bet they weren’t fantasising about being a family-man wage-serf while they burned rubber.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 220: u-ey A U-turn in a car from one side of the road to the other, eg, ‘You guys want to do a few u-eys, burn some rubber, eh?’ ANZ.
2017		V. McDermid Insidious Intent (2018) 92: [T]he perfect drag strip for boy racers to burn rubber in their pimped-out hatchbacks, the roar of their phat exhausts splitting skulls.
2017		T. Pluck Bad Boy Boogie [ebook] ‘This thing burn rubber?’ The cabbie snorted. ‘Maybe if I set it on fire’.
2017		R. Friedman Street Warrior 140: The Ford left rubber fleeing the scene but got stuck in a queue of cars at a red light.
2024		C. Stella Joey Piss Pot 187: Joseph watched his grandson go to the car [...] then pull away from the curb burning rubber.

2. (orig. US black) to have sexual intercourse [fig. use of sense 1].

2000

(con. 1940s–60s) Décharné Straight from the Fridge Dad.

3. (US campus) to go, to leave, esp. quickly [fig. use of sense 1].

1993		Eble Campus Sl. Oct. 3: head – go, leave [...] Also burn rubber, hit the streets.
1994		M. Ribowsky Don’t Look Back 97: Cool Papa Bell [...] burned rubber around the bases.
1998		Eble Campus Sl. Nov. 1: burn rubber – speed up: ‘I am so late for work; I’ve really got to burn rubber.’.