Bridgestone changed the tyre allocation concept, for next 4 races they say
Posted on July 02, 2009 by F1Wolf
Here come the Bridgestones ...
With the exception of Monaco Grand Prix Bridgestone this season has been following the concept of leaving a gap in rubber stiffness between the two allocated tyres for each race. That means that for example drivers have had to use super soft and medium or soft and hard rather than super soft and soft or medium and hard compounds at each GP (unless the race is declared wet).
For the four races from the Hungarian Grand Prix to the Italian Grand Prix Bridgestone will allocate consecutive compound pairings for each of these races.
Hirohide Hamashima, Bridgestone Director of Motorsport Tyre Development:
“We have made the change to the tyre allocation concept based on the data we have collected from races so far this year combined with our knowledge of the tracks we visit for these races. The cars of 2009 are very different to those used last year so we have learnt a lot so far this year, and they do use their tyres differently from before.
Hungary is a circuit where the characteristics demand our softest tyres. This is also true for street courses, and we used the softest allocation earlier in the year at Monaco, and will again in Valencia. In Spa the weather temperatures can be quite cool, so the hard compound could have caused difficulties, and the super soft would have been too soft for this track, so that means the allocation of medium and soft is obvious. In Monza the hard compound would have given too big a difference between it and the soft, so we will bring the soft and the medium.”
The allocations are as follows:
Hungary – super soft and soft
Valencia – super soft and soft
Belgium – soft and medium
Monza – soft and medium
Bridgestone says the nature of these four tracks required the change in the policy but there will be many people out there believing that the whole non-consecutive tyre policy is a failure and Bridgestone may be dropping it for good. Well, we will see when the tyre allocations for the final fly away races come out.
The next GP in Germany will feature super soft and medium tyres.
Photo: F1Wolf
Discussion: 4 Comments
4 Responses to “Bridgestone changed the tyre allocation concept, for next 4 races they say”
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Wesley
- 3rd Jul, 09 05:07am
As I posted on F1 fanatic – I think this is much better than watching cars equiped with the wrong parts.It would be even better if they allowed the teams to choose thier own rubber for each track.That would still mix it up and make it more strategic.
F1Wolf
(author comment)
- 3rd Jul, 09 03:07pm
I suspect that if they allowed teams to choose their own rubber for each race they would probably all end up using the same anyway. The teams would probably only be able to make the decision after free practice, that means that all the compounds would have to be shipped to each race in big enough quantity for each to race them, just in case … With 4 compounds for dry conditions and 2 more for wet conditions, that would be quite a lot of tyres to fly around. And in most cases only one of them would be used.
I do not mind the drivers having to use both compounds in each race (it also aloows Bridgestone to ship less tyres to each race and saves some money). But the policy of having non consecutive tyres for each race, that do I find weird…
Timmie
- 6th Jul, 09 08:07am
I’d say failed effort to make the cars differential of speed bigger between tyres. Can’t see how it would ever work and though having two different compounds is a nice idea, teams pretty much pit and swap to the same compounds anyway throughout the race, so again they get no real parity between two cars there either. No one is willing to risk anything for a gamble, which is totally understandable.
You can look back in the early 90’s when they used to bring compounds to cover every type from soft to hard, lol and back then there were 26 cars on the grid, plus they had to do pre-qualifying to narrow it down from the 30 odd cars that would turn up! Now wouldn’t that be nice to see that again!
Timmie
- 6th Jul, 09 08:07am
Note: If they were all competitive of course!!