The Great Michelin Debate.

Last weekend was the darkest weekend in Formula One’s long and torrid history as we saw the farce that was a six car procession, as no one was really on racing terms with anyone, and it was very much a manufactured result in the up-most.

But why?

Indianapolis is a unique track in the way that it is a NASCAR track primarily, which hosts a grand prix on an infield section whilst running a small segment of the oval NASCAR track. This involves an F1 car running at speeds of more than 200mph along a right hand corner, banked at 9 degrees. It doesn’t sound much, I know, but it’s a tenth of perpendicular. It is a pretty big fraction. Because the NASCAR cars weren’t getting enough grip as they flew round this corner a few months before the Grand Prix, the track was diamond cut, making it ultra grippy by dramatically increasing the friction forces between track and tyre. The extra grip is all well and good, but it creates more heat in the tyre, wearing the tyres down much faster.

So, Michelin brought tyres over the ocean as to suit the configuration of last years track surface, which makes perfect sense, I don’t think they were given much information about the new diamond cut track surface. This though, caused huge problems. With much more down force than with NASCAR’s, the F1 cars were generating too much friction between tyre and track, resulting in huge temperature build ups in the tyre, the wearing of the sidewall of the tyre and then failure through fatigue of the tyre sidewall. In short, the rear left went ‘POP’ at 200mph sending the car and driver hurtling into a wall at speeds in excess of 190mph. As happened with Ralf Schumacher in Friday practice, highlighting that there might be a problem.

Michelin performed tests on the tyres, but could not find the actual route of the tyre failures, but nonetheless knew that they were unsafe to race, and would most likely fail 10 – 15 laps into usage. They then had no choice but to tell the teams that the tyres were unsafe to race at full speed through the now infamous Turn 13.

The fact that this was known on Friday evening, and no workable solution could be found by Sunday by a group of adults is laughable.

Never the less, the tyres were run at much higher pressures for the one qualifying lap they had to complete, whilst new tyres were shipped over from France.

Here’s where it begins to get complicated.

Bringing a new tyre to a Grand Prix weekend is against regulations, so the FIA blocked this move.

Installing a chicane before Turn 12, so the cars ran no faster than 177mph (a safe speed apparently) through Turn 13 was blocked by Max Mosley – I think – or the FIA as the track could not be changed under regulations. Odd, I know, but the new braking area might test brakes beyond their expected load and throw a few teams out of kilter. Safety would also have to be taken into consideration, as chicanes normally mean a crash or something more times than not.

As the Michelin shod teams (7 out of the 10 competing) tried to battle it out in meeting after meeting in search of a compromise, so as to at least out a show on for all the viewing public. They offered to race starting behind the Bridgestone runners and without winning championship points, so handing the advantage to the three Bridgestone teams whilst keeping the show going for the paying fans.

Unfortunately, these meetings came to nothing as Max Mosley (The President of the FIA) would only say that the Michelin teams should run slower through the corner so as to be safe for their tyres, without any other alteration or consideration. But, how slow is slow? And how safe would it really be? The loads would still be going through the tyres, and the risk to the Bridgestone teams which could still go at 200mph through the corner whilst the others had to go more than 40mph slower would be considerable, as this kind of speed differential is more than just slightly risky.

The result of these failed negotiations was the spine chilling sight those who watched on Sunday saw. A 20 car formation grid set off, only for 14 of these to pull into the pit lane before taking to the real starting grid, leaving the 2 Ferraris, the 2 Jordans and the 2 Minardis (who only raced because the Jordans did) alone on the grid. It was much more than a dull race, with the Ferraris barely racing each other at all, and the other 4 a lap apart from each other in a different race on their own.

The fall out for these failures will be hard felt, and Formula One’s future in the U.S. will never really recover from such a hit. Sponsors will be doubtful, and the in-fighting within F1’s ranks has now hit the lime light in a more ugly way than predicted. Litigation proceedings will be going underway, as fans demand heir money back – even though, by rules and regulations, there was a race. All seven of the Michelin teams have been called to a hearing on Wednesday 29th June in Paris, whilst calls for Max Mosley’s resignation are heard from a variety of sources.

There’s no doubt that the sport has been brought into disrepute over what happened at the weekend at Indianapolis, but the damage will not hit F1 in Europe quite as hard as F1 in America. It’s a disappointment that such a farce could happen, but the fall out from will have repercussions like we’ve never seen.

R.I.P. F1 in America.

Good luck F1!