Mechanical failures in wood are the result of an imbalance between wood strength and stresses. European chestnut is a wood species very often affected by ring shake, a concentric failure parallel to the annual growth ring. The timing and the stem position in which ring shakes occur let us suppose that, combined with a radial structural weakness, growth stresses result in ring shake development. However, to this date no evidence of a relationship between high stress level and elevated ring shake incidence in chestnut wood has been supported. To investigate growth stresses, longitudinal displacements induced by stress release were estimated at the periphery of the stem using the single hole drilling method. To examine ring shake, the length and position of splits occurring on cut sections near stress measurements (breast height) were surveyed. Results do not show any clear relationship between the level of strain-induced displacement (SID) and ring shake intensity. However, due to some limitations of the applied method in estimating stress levels, it is not possible to asses or reject whether ring shake incidence is related to elevated growth stress.