Round 7 Dutch GP post-race debrief
Bridgestone slick compounds used:
Front: Soft, Medium. Rear: Soft, Medium
A dry Dutch GP weekend was dominated
by Fiat Yamaha’s Valentino Rossi, who claimed pole and took a decisive victory,
becoming only the second rider to reach 100 grand prix triumphs. In doing so,
he moved himself into the lead of the world championship. The championship top
three formed the podium, whilst Colin Edwards equalled his best result of the
season with fourth. An intense race-long battle for sixth position was won by
James Toseland to score his best result of the season. Bridgestone slick
compound choices were varied, with most of the field favouring the medium
compound for front and rear but four riders opting for the softer specification
rear slick.
Q&A with Tohru Ubukata - Bridgestone
Motorsport – Manager, Motorcycle Race Tyre
Development
How can you
summarise the weekend from Bridgestone’s perspective?
We did not have the challenge of
very high track temperatures this weekend, as we did in Catalunya, but we did
see a large fluctuation in track temperature over the three days. On Thursday,
the track was 41 degrees Celsius for free practice. For qualifying it was just
31 degrees, and for the race 35 degrees. A temperature change of ten degrees is
quite significant in terms of available grip and tyre wear, yet there were no
problems for either our soft or medium compound slicks during the weekend.
How did the
soft and the medium compound Bridgestone slicks perform during the weekend?
Assen was a good example of how
versatile our compound ranges are this season. In the first free practice,
Randy de Puniet was fastest on the medium compound Bridgestone slicks when the
track temperature was the highest of the weekend. During qualifying, the medium
compound front slick was still the favoured choice even though the track temperature
was much lower, and the medium compound rear also worked very well in the
cooler conditions.
Of course, towards the end of the
qualifying session riders used the soft compound rear Bridgestone slick for
their best times, and this is something we are used to seeing now this season. This
is no surprise though. Tyre
compound choice is a trade-off between peak grip and tyre durability. For a
qualifying run, each rider does not need race-distance durability from their
tyres which means they can run the softer option rear slick for its added
traction to go faster over a shorter number of laps. The medium compound front
Bridgestone slick was favoured because of the additional stability it provided,
particularly under braking.
The race also gave us another good
example of our compound versatility. Only four riders chose the soft compound
rear Bridgestone slick, whilst the rest of the field used the medium compound. Pramac
Racing’s Mika Kallio and San Carlo Honda Gresini’s Toni Elias were two of the
riders to use the soft compound rear, and were able to match the pace of the
medium compound riders around them in the battle for sixth position. Mika was
leading this battle until the last lap when unfortunately he crashed out and
Toni was able to close down the group and climb into eighth at the finish
before being given a time penalty by the stewards after the race. Toni was also
able to record his fastest time on lap 18 of the 26-lap race, which is a good
indication of the durability and consistency of the Bridgestone slicks.
"Assen was a good example of how
versatile our compound ranges are this season"