Tyre Situation In Silverstone Is What F1 Needs | Dhimas’s Opinion

I thought 2 races at Silverstone will have the same pattern as we had in Red Bull Ring. The first race could be exciting and unpredictable, while the second one would be more predictable and refined strategy wise as all teams had collected the data from the first one. But I was utterly wrong. Tyre compound variations made the spectacle from drama and an unexpected outcome of the races.

Rough relationship between the track and the rubber

Silverstone is infamous for its high-speed corners and being harsh to the tyres. Current F1 cars are running flat-out through Copse, Maggots, and Becketts leads to a massive punishment for the tyres, particularly the left side. Not only that, but a high temperature also threatened the teams with tyre temperature management issues which can easily cost them with blistering if they don’t do it properly. The high stress made Pirelli assign its hardest tyre compound to be used for all teams. The hard tyre will eventually be used by all teams in this condition unless they want to put on softer tyres and compromise with a long first stint, 2 stop strategy, or a big chance for the tyre to blow up if they didn’t manage it enough.

Tyre compound used at the first race was different than the recent one. Pirelli deployed C1 to C3 compound at the British Grand Prix as initially planned. On the second race at Silverstone, which is the F1 70th Anniversary Grand Prix, all teams were provided with tyre choices of C2 to C4 compound which is a softer compound set. That’s why there were different strategies between races, and the teams could lose some time if they didn’t adapt correctly.

Mercedes met its biggest obstacle yet this year

Mercedes W11 is an utterly dominant car this year. It is almost perfect compared to the others. The Black Arrows dominated the field since day one in Austria and expected to be so at Silverstone as they were known to be rapid at this track since the hybrid era. And they did.

On one lap performance, they are the fastest by some margin. In both races, they were ahead by more than a second to their closest rival. But on Sunday they met their sort of like their kryptonite.

The first race is pretty seamless for them, at least until 10 laps before the end. Both Mercedes was planning to use the C1 hard tyre compound towards the end. Valtteri Bottas had a noticeable vibration on his car near the end of the race. This is a sign of tyre wear, but he doesn’t feel a significant amount of grip loss. I suspect this is due to how well balanced his car was. It was lap 50 out of 52 when his front left tyre gave up, blew his chance to easily grab P2 and maintain a close gap to Hamilton in the championship ladder. Drama hit its peak when Lewis Hamilton’s front left tyre also decided to give up half a lap towards the finish lap. Fortunately for him though, he still won the race despite Max Verstappen catching rapidly on fresh soft rubber.

The second race was entirely different for them. All tyres option was softer, Pirelli increased the minimum pressure to prevent puncture, and a very high track surface temperature over 40 degrees Celcius. Starting on C3 medium tyres, they are struggling to pull a gap with Max Verstappen who started on C2 hard tyres. They stopped earlier than Max to change for the hard tyres, but they can’t even match Max’s pace, who was on a 20+ laps old hard tyre. Their tyre blistered so quickly, and even at some point, their pace was matched by Charles Leclerc who was on an old hard tyre set. Max Verstappen won the race very comfortably.

On both races, Mercedes was struck by tyre-related problem and for me its surprising because I thought they are immortal this season with that masterpiece of a car. There something not right with their tyre wear, although all the other teams also had a hard time with the tyres at Silverstone, no one came across more severe problem than “The Black Arrows”.

Why it failed for Mercedes?

From 2 races they had different tyre problems. The first one was asymptomatic until a couple of laps before the race ended. Lewis even didn’t feel anything suspicious right before his front left tyres got punctured, neither did Valterri. Pirelli said that the cause of both punctures and also Carlos Sainz’s was simply because the tyres used for too long. Most teams pitted under the safety car on lap 13 to change into hard tyres to be used until the finish line. This is more than three quarters the race length on one of the most tyre demanding tracks of the calendar. They also pointed out that these cars are getting faster each year and set the record of the most significant forces ever seen on tyres generated by the fastest Formula 1 cars in history. We also have to remember that this tyre is the exact same spec from last year’s as every team rejected the initially planned 2020 tyre spec which might be more durable than the one we use.

After those failures and examining the problems, Pirelli decided to increase the minimum tyre pressure to reduce stress on the tyre construction. Lewis thought that this might be the reason why they are immensely struggling with the tyres on the race. The first stint was not too bad as they can keep 1–2 position although they can’t pull a significant gap to Max whose on harder tyres. The disaster came with the hard tyres which they already had blisters on it only a couple of laps after pitting. I never saw Mercedes car had this bad of a problem with tyre wear before. From that point on, they were struggling to catch Max and handed him an unexpected win.

Max Verstappen has risen to the top

I genuinely didn’t expect or even dare to predict Max Verstappen will win the second race at Silverstone. Yes, there was a hope that Mercedes would have another tyre problem, but I didn’t expect it to be that big of a problem. How Max and Red Bull benefitted from that is also mindblowing. I never heard a driver can outpace a car which was 1 second faster than his in qualy that easy in the race. Max pulled the gap comfortably at the end of his first stint, which was using the hard tyres from the start while both Mercedes were just pitted for brand new hard tyres. From then on, the rest is history.

Red Bull’s performance during the first race was pretty standard. But, last Sunday they were just banging on it as a team. Both cars looking very good in the ‘race in terms of overall pace and tyre wear. Alex Albon was able to finish on the P5 from his starting spot on P9. He looked very racy that day and ready to make some daring overtake, notably when he passed Kimi Raikkonen from the outside of Copse corner on lap 13. Both Red Bulls looked very prime that day.

Although at this point, I still cannot judge Red Bull’s car confidently. Especially with the fact that Alex Albon is struggling with it. I can’t say if the car is actually worse than we thought and Max made it look good, or it’s just Alex who hasn’t found his comfort zone in the car. Both the team and their drivers should have higher morale after that victory and keep pushing with the power of dreams for closing the gap on track and off-track to Mercedes.

This kind of tyres is precisely what we need

Formula One has been seeking for something to add spectacles to their show since years ago. When they decided to use high degradation tyres from Pirelli since 2011, it has its own plus-minus since then. During the early years, the tyres were too prone. It’s considered as dangerous, particularly after British GP 2013 when 6 cars had punctures during the race. From then on, Pirelli made more reliable tyres which allow teams to have 1 stop strategy in almost every track on the calendar. That is not exciting.

I think F1 and Pirelli need to find a sweet spot where the typical strategy is a 2-stops. Also, all teams need to be responsible with the length of each stint for the sake of the safety of their drivers. More than 1 stop will vary the strategy between each car the grid, and that will be more exciting, at least compared to current common practices.