After receiving some pretty stinging criticism from the MotoGP riders, and after the lastest string of crashes during Friday morning practice at Sachsenring all to blame on cold tires and numerous Safety Commission meetings, Bridgestone has decided to increase the number of tires and compounds available to the riders, which is something that the riders have been asking for in the last two years.
The changes will come into effect from the Brno GP and each rider ’s allocation will now see three compound options for the front slick (previously it was two) and nine front tires.
The usual ten rear slicks will be available with two options, only the number of options available have increased so the riders will have wider variety to choose from, with a maximum of six of one compound option and four of the other.
For the Laguna Seca GP, Bridgestone had already decided to bring in a softer rear tire.
Hiroshi Yamada – Manager, Bridgestone Motorsport Department said, “We have worked hard with the FIM, Dorna and the riders to make this proposal and the necessary regulation amendments and we make these significant changes to our tyre compound allocation procedure as part of our ongoing efforts to focus more on improving warm-up performance.
When rider comments about warm-up performance started last year, we developed the extra soft compound rubber for the rear tyres to improve the situation.
Then at the start of this year we already selected softer compound options for five of the first nine races, again to provide tyres that warm-up more quickly.
Then during the Italian Grand Prix we decided to bring softer spec rears to a further six of the remaining nine races, and with this latest change to our tyre approach we very much hope to arrive at a situation where the riders feel satisfied with the extra tyre choices they have each weekend and more comfortable with additional softer tyres in the cooler morning sessions.
The introduction of FP1 on Friday morning this year changed the situation for us because conditions are never ideal on Friday morning and this is when we have seen most of the crashes.
Nevertheless, we take rider safety very seriously and of course we are sorry to have seen the crashes that we have this year and want to avoid such unnecessary occurrences.
I hope this fundamental change to the Official Tyre Supplier situation demonstrates that we listen to riders and have long been working towards such a compromise to make them feel safer and more comfortable and confident in the warm-up performance of our tyres.
”Hirohide Hamashima – Assistant to Director, Motorsport Tyre Development Division:“We have spent a great deal of time speaking personally with riders, especially in recent months, and the raft of changes that we have proposed are in direct response to their feedback and comments, specifically relating to the warm-up performance of our tyres in the cooler morning sessions.
It is important to note that all riders are very complimentary about the race-distance performance of our tyres, and that a number of lap records have been set in the last year on them, including today here in Germany, which indicate that outright performance is very good.
However, we realise the need to focus more on the area of warm-up performance, and whilst we continue our development of a new family of tyres for next year which feature a softer construction, these changes that come into effect from Brno are our best effort at reacting as quickly as we can, and in a way satisfactory to all parties, mid-way through the season.
The riders have agreed with our proposal so I am confident that the changes will provide them with what they’ve been asking for in terms of a greater number of softer specification tyres each weekend.
”