Race of rubber

06 March 2009

2009 marks the year of most changes to ever be witnessed between seasons since the inauguration of the Formula One World Championship in 1950. The testing ban in particular means that teams and drivers have significantly less time to develop their much-changed cars before the Australian Grand Prix on March 29. Also in a frantic developing phase of their year is sole tyre manufacutrer Bridgestone, which has even been testing 2010 tyres due to the lack of available track time.

The 2009 aerodynamic regulations have been designed to decrease the amount of downforce available," explained technical manager Tetsuro Kobayashi. "In the dry, the lost grip has been partially countered by the greater amount of grip from the slicks and the bigger contact patch they have with the track.

In the wet, the aerodynamic situation is the same, but our tyre specifications have not changed since 2008, so this means there is less overall grip in the wet than previously and the drivers will have to adapt accordingly."

With the lack of grooves in slick tyres, recognition of the two tyre types at a race weekend has changed slightly: "We will mark the softer of the two compounds with available at a race weekend with green bands on the outer edges of the sidewalls - we have used green as it shows our support of the FIA's Make Cars Green campaign" Kobayashi added.