Firestone has brought a different compound tire to IndyCar’s season-opening round in St. Petersburg, which could lead to a bevy of pit stops during the event.
The main difference this year is that the softer alternate compound tire is considerably softer than in seasons past.
Teams were aware of the update coming into the weekend, but once on track they realized the wear rates were even higher than predicted.
“Yeah, I think it was more extreme than I thought it was going to be,” said Colton Herta after qualifying, describing how quickly his tires were being used up.
“Usually when we have deg races, we deg on the red tires or soft compound, it’s more so like you can maybe get a second lap in in qualifying. It was interesting to feel that.
“I think [the race] is going to be interesting because of that. For sure no doubt in my mind a three-stopper. There’s no way anybody takes these tires to 30 laps or whatever it is to do the two-stopper.
“How long can you make them last? What is that going to look like? Is it going to be five laps? 15 laps? It’s all going to be dependent, at least for us, on what guys do behind us. We’ll kind of pit from there.”
Tires, tires, tires
Sunday’s race is 100 laps in length, leaving plenty of chances for drivers to come down pit lane and take on a fresh set of tires. Especially if the extreme predictions of the softer tires only being usable for less than five laps comes true.
An added consideration is that the allocation of tires has shifted this year, with each driver being given one less set of the harder primary tires per weekend.
Teams may well choose to fit a scrubbed set of primary tires during the race if they have to cycle through three or four sets before the checkered flags wave.
Firestone has to walk a fine line, of course, producing tires that are safe, reliable, and also degrade at a rate that makes the racing interesting and keeps the drivers happy.
This year they appear to have chosen a compound that is a bit less durable than their usual selection.
Whether or not the tires actually wear as quickly in race conditions as predicted is yet to be seen, but at the very least there will be a mix of pit strategies as teams evaluate the situation on the fly.
The season opening race from the streets of St. Petersburg gets underway in just a couple hours, with green flags waving at 12:30 PM eastern time.
