Update | The temperature lowering of the tire heating may have been canceled after Verstappen’s comments

Formula 1 wants to completely take tire heating out of the sport from 2024. That’s why this year it started lowering the maximum temperature a tire blanket could have, with the ultimate goal of not using it at all within two years. An ill-advised and very dangerous plan, according to Max Verstappen, among others, supported by his colleagues.

This F1 season started with the temperature dropping to warm the tires. Where last year it was allowed to be 100 degrees Celsius in the front and 80 degrees Celsius in the back, it has already been reduced to 70 degrees Celsius for this season. For 2023, it should drop by another 20 degrees Celsius, which means it will reach 50 degrees Celsius. This has already been tested during the US GP and will also be tested in Mexico, already reports Race This appears to have been omitted and the normal 70°C is applied. In 2024, tire heaters should be completely gone.

Verstappen anticipates problems

Verstappen already anticipates a ‘gentle drift show’ when tests are run at 50°C max, and the Dutchman anticipates problems when heaters are completely banned from 2024. “I think we’ll see a lot of accidents after that. It’s tough. It’s going to be a deterioration.” The tires are very different because your tires are very cold, and you slip a lot in the first few laps, and tire pressure goes through the roof, so your tires will deteriorate a lot.”

In Austin, the Red Bull Racing driver was already having problems after running on the toughest compound during tests with the 50C and almost ran into the pit lane. He didn’t really like it. “At the moment I’m not really enjoying it, but a lot of drivers are saying the same and of course we have to find a solution. Austin is still a track where you can get on the tires easily because of the fast corners,” he points out why it’s less bad in Austin than elsewhere. .

Since you still have a decent track in Austin to get the temperature quickly, there are also, say, tighter street circuits where it’s nearly impossible to get the temperature in the tires quickly. “If you go to a circuit like a street circuit, like Monaco, you can imagine half and half conditions, I think it will take you half the race before the temperature is in your tires,” Verstappen predicts.

Norris and Magnussen behind Verstappen

Lando Norris agrees with the Dutchman and also states that the circuit in Austin provides “the best possible conditions” for the tests. The Briton also expects many malfunctions when implementing the new rules. “Yes, they will be there. These were the best possible conditions for these tires: super hot and warm, high speed in the first sector to get the temperature. And they weren’t nice. It’s very easy to block from the front, very easy to block from behind, unpredictable. him at all.”

Driving on other tracks is a guarantee of problems. “Imagine going to a track that is cooler, a little damp or something. Everyone is going to run over a car at some point. No driver wants it in principle. It is a Formula 1 car of the current era that has been built with all kinds of aerodynamic cars and things. Which are not made to run on cold tires are not like Formula 2 or Formula 3 cars where you can just drive them, throw them and do whatever you want. They don’t really work that way. We will have discussions about this, among all the drivers and the GPDA.

Kevin Magnussen also disagrees with F1’s decision on tire heating regulations, and agrees with both drivers. “I really don’t like it because I don’t think Pirelli, the FIA ​​and Formula 1 really understand how difficult it is to get heat in these tires even if they go out at 70 degrees Celsius. They’ve tried them at 50 degrees Celsius and it’s really hard,” said the Dane. It’s because they didn’t drive these cars, they don’t understand.”

So the Haas driver thinks it’s unsafe to completely turn off the tire heating. I think there is a security problem. It’s a very high load on these cars because of the downforce, so the tire has to be very stiff, so when it’s cold it’s hard, just like on ice. In sports cars, I think the tire has a lower working range and is soft, so when it’s cold it’s very easy to heat up. At 50 degrees Celsius here, it’s a big problem. So there is no tire heating, a big problem.

Bottas comes with a warning meter sound

Valtteri Bottas partially agrees with the adjustment that F1 wants to make, but believes it should only be done when the tires can handle it, which is certainly not the case at the moment, according to the art. “Now if you were to stop in a pit on a hard tire with no blankets, on a track like this it would definitely be very risky and almost a safety hazard,” he said in Mexico. “Or on a street circuit with a completely cold tyre, because at that temperature the tire is more like plastic.”

So when a tire modification is made, perhaps more is possible according to the Alfa Romeo driver. “If the belt has been changed and if it is adapted to run at a much lower range, why not,” he is positive, adding that the tires are definitely not ready at this point. “Right now, and the tire we tried in Austin, it just couldn’t handle the blanket of the 50C, it was really, really, really slippery at first. And that was Austin and it was hot. So on some circuits that would really be a problem.

Update 9.40 p. (1/2) | The temperature lowering of the tire heating may have been canceled after Verstappen’s comments

Pirelli may not continue to lower the temperature of the tire heaters in Formula 1. The tire heating was from seventy degrees to fifty degrees in order to save energy, but that raised eyebrows, among other things, with Max Verstappen. The Red Bull Racing driver has stated that there will be more accidents. I tried Pirelli last weekend and found a potential solution to the problem.

Therefore, drivers’ comments about reducing the temperature of the tire heaters are taken into account by Pirelli. So the tire supplier conducted a trial in Mexico. “Our research showed that heating tires to 70 degrees for two hours instead of three hours uses less energy than three hours at 50 degrees,” the newspaper quoted Mario Isola as saying. Motorsport.com. “Our current plan is to propose heating the tires to 70 degrees for two hours by 2023.”