Formula 1 Jam

With the loss in downforce thanks to the aerodynamic changes to the 2009 package, the speeds of the 2009 cars would have reduced dramatically compared to their 2008 counterparts. To counter this sudden decrease in speed of the cars and to provide better mechanical grip, FIA decided to reintroduce Slick tyres to Formula One after 11 years.

Slick tyres provide much better road grip compared to the grooved tyres used in Formula One since 1998. The testing times of the cars in the winter tests proved that the slick tyres helped the cars regain the lost aerodynamic grip and more.

Bridgestone will again bring two sets of tyre compounds (out of  Hard, Medium, Soft and Supersoft) to each race.  This season the difference in the tyres will be far more pronounced as the compounds will not be adjacent choices in tyre compounds as last year.  ie, if for last year’s race the choice of compounds were – Hard and medium.  This year it will be Hard and Soft.  For each race the preferred compound will be chosen and skipping the adjacent choice the next one will be used as the option.

The other changes to the tyres include:

• The tyres known as standard wets last year are now called intermediates and extreme wets are called wets.  This is only so that the audience can follow the race much better.
• If a race starts behind the safety car, drivers must start the race on wet weather tyres.  A clear safety measure.
• The softer of the two dry compounds available and the wet weather tyres will be marked with green rings instead of the white groove.  Again for easy identification.

What does this rule change mean to the fans?

Expect strategies to vary, atleast into the first few races.  The difference is speeds of the cars in the two compounds will mean that any driver/team would prefer to do minimum running on the less preferable tyre.  Car design and how it grains the tyres will become paramount as the season unfolds.

Slicks were chosen to increase the mechanical grip of the cars, but in the rain the wets and intermediate tyres are similar to last year meaning that speeds on a wet track will be dramatically much lesser than last year.  One lap delay in switching to slicks can mean the difference between a win and being a back marker.

Which Teams/Drivers will gain an advantage from this rule change?

Wet weather speacialists will gain a major advantage in changing conditions.  This was apparent last year but this year you can see the effect being multiplied.

Drivers that are really good in controlling the wear of their tyres should easily outperform their teammates, atleast on tracks where tyre wear is a concern.

Driver skill is under the microscope this year and we should be able to see some drivers easily outperform what their cars are capable of.  An interesting season awaits us…

Images thanks to Wikipedia