New Rules for Motorsport Tyres are Good News for Michelin
20 Oct 06
Emily Henry
Contributing Writer Michelin has announced its
contentedness with the new rules being imposed on
motorsport tyres.
Following a meeting in Barcelona, The World Motor Sport
Council plans to introduce two new regulations
concerning motorsport tyres, set to come into effect on
New Year's Day 2007. The new regulations were outlined
in a press release issued by the Federation
Internationale de L'Automobile (FIA) and aim to maintain
competition between tyre manufacturers in the World
Championship. Negotiations held by Michelin, Dunlop and
Bridgestone aimed to determine the effects and action
required in response to the Motorsport regulations.
Michelin has backed the decisions which allow tyre
suppliers in F1 to provide two sets of tyres for each of
their contracted teams, as opposed to previous
regulations which enforced to two types of tyres for all
of their teams. This change comes in response to the
Bridgestone/Ferrari advantage in 2002, where Bridgestone
was able to design tyres specifically for Ferrari as its
only top team, while Michelin was forced to compromise
in order to satisfy both Mclaren and Williams. Tyre
companies will now be able to tailor tyres to their
teams and competition bewteen tyre companies will be
maintained.
Nicolas Goubet, Michelin's director of motorcycle
racing, spoke on behalf of Michelin when he proclaimed
that they were "happy with the new rules", adding that,
"the tyre agreement is a very good agreement, especially
if you look at what is happening in other Motorsport
championships, particularly in Formula One switching to
a single tyre maker rule." For Michelin, the new
regulations ensure that tyre companies are able to
compete. Goubet expained that the CEO of Dorna, the
MotoGP rights holders, "wanted different tyre brands to
continue fighting on the racetrack."
Despite Michelin's excitement about the freedom the new
agreement allows in way of competition, Goubet also
expressed the concerns the regulations incite: "Once the
objective to keep everyone involved was clear, the
second most important point was to ensure that we don't
have too much cost inflation, because costs can escalate
when you have major manufacturers competing in a highly
prestigious series." In light of the threat of
inflation, new restrictions on tyre testing has been
introduced: "In this respect, the most important factor
was to reduce the possibility of test teams to test
tyres. From next year test teams can only run at
official IRTA tests plus one track during the season and
one track during the off-season."
Michelin has enjoyed a win-rate of 95% in the last ten
years of premier class Motorcycle racing.
[http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/formula_one/2369307.stm#Tyres]
[http://www.reifenpresse.de/CDML007/en/gast/fs_kurzmeldungen.html]
[http://www.crash.net/news_View~t~Michelin-welcomes-tyre-and-testing-regulations-~cid~6~id~139099.htm] |
