If Michelin broke the records in four races, at Losail, Mugello, Misano and Valencia, for its return to MotoGP, the rest was not all smooth sailing.
After a fanfare arrival in Qatar (see exclusive interview here), from Argentina, the problems encountered by Scott Redding put Bibendum on alert, and if its reaction was dazzling (see exclusive interview here), the level of grip of its rear tire, although legendary, suffered, in the name of safety.
And despite at least two progressions in this area, the men from Clermont-Ferrand have not regained the level of grip of the beginning of 2016, again for reasons of safer but less efficient constructions.
This is therefore the objective that Michelin technicians have set for themselves, alongside the introduction of a new tire with a different profile for the front.
Nicolas Goubert, Deputy Director, Technical Director and Supervisor of the MotoGP program, spoke on the subject during a specific press conference in Valencia.
Excerpts…
Nicolas Goubert: “At first, the drivers were surprised by the grip available at the rear. Of course, what happened in Argentina made us change the tire and, especially right after Argentina, the rear didn't have as much grip as before.”
“Argentina was not a good event for us and we realized that our rear tires were not strong enough. But the positive thing is that we reacted very quickly and within a week we had a pretty robust tire, ready to race in Austin.”
“I think everyone involved realized how committed we were to this sport, because being able to build new tires in less than a week was very demanding.”
“From Austin onwards, for safety reasons we of course had to keep this type of robust rear tire and when we arrived at Jerez we realized how much it affected the performance of the bike.”
“We had a lot of criticism in Jerez (see exclusive interview here), with drivers complaining of a lack of traction with the new construction. Once again we tried to react very quickly and, between Le Mans and Mugello, we took a step forward.”
“At Le Mans, we broke the lap record in qualifying and the race times were very competitive. In Mugello the race time was shortened and we spent the summer with a lot of positive results, like in Misano, in Brno in the dry and so on.”
“Really, for us, Misano and Mugello were as good as Qatar, although they took place after Argentina (and the consequent construction change).
“Then, to finish the season, we had the three overseas races, during which we encountered very unexpected weather. The positive for us was that even with unexpected conditions, we had something to offer the teams and riders to have confidence with.”
“Sometimes we've been a bit conservative...places like Aragon, and maybe Phillip Island or Motegi. The (rear) tires were a bit hard. Almost everyone chose the soft tire, which had not been the case until then. One explanation for Phillip Island is the weather. If we had had 15 or 20 degrees warmer on the track, it would have been different.”
“But even after Argentina, on some circuits, we showed very, very good (rear) grip. But he has not been consistent over the season. Because sometimes you hit the nail on the head, and sometimes you have a lot of room for improvement.”
“This is where we have to work for next season.”
“For the rear we are going to keep the same profile, but already we did some tests in Barcelona with some very different things that we could not use this year. We will continue to work on this for our back build, as it has shown good potential.”
“But the first thing will be the new front profile. I really hope to confirm the positive results obtained on the two or three circuits where we have already tested. Once we have the profile fixed we will work slightly on the construction and the rubber, but I would say the rubber will be a small adaptation.”
