With track temperatures in excess of 50°C during the day, much higher than previously forecast, Tyres and their effect on Strategy are a major talking point for this year?s Le Mans Race.
As you may imagine the Tyres for a 24 hour Endurance race have a completely different behaviour to those used in Sprint racing such as Formula One. The Dunlop and Michelin products exhibit a wider operating window and can deal with cooler temperatures. This operating window refers to a range of bulk temperatures in which the tyre offers the best level of grip.

A tyre can be simplified into two layers: the thin outer surface which is in contact with the track, and the thicker bulk layer which makes up the rest of the tyre. To achieve maximum grip the ideal scenario is to have both of those layers at the same temperature (to avoid one layer moving at a different rate to the other which can lead to overheating and wear), with that temperature in the optimum working range. As these tyres are designed to work during the heat of the day and the coolness of night the working range is wider but also lower. Therefore, it is much easier to get the tyres up to temperature or ?switch on?. This also means that they have better temperature recovery, so if a driver goes offline on the dirty track for an overtake, the sudden loss of temperature can be recovered, especially by the more experienced drivers and so the tyre can be bought back up to the working window easily.
In F1, once the tyre is out ...