The Belgian Grand Prix tyre STRATEGIES available to F1 teams amid forecasted rain

belgiangp, pitlane — Photo: © LAT Images

Belgian Grand Prix

The Belgian Grand Prix tyre STRATEGIES available to F1 teams amid forecasted rain

Forecasted rain is set to play havoc with the tyre choices and strategies made by F1 teams during the race

Shubham Sangodkar

Sunday 30 July 2023 12:57

Max Verstappen's grid-penalty coupled with an uncertain weather forecast for the Belgian Grand Prix means that fans could be in for a few surprises when the lights go out at Spa.

The teams also ran extreme wet weather tyres followed by the intermediates during Saturday's sprint race, meaning that little is known over the performance of the slicks during a race itself.

With that in mind, here are a few of the options that are likely to be available to the teams and drivers on race day at Spa

What’s the quickest strategy?

The safety car led out the grid ahead of Saturday's rolling start for the sprint race

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If you have been following events this weekend since Friday, then you will know that there has been very little in the way of dry weather running.

In fact, there has been nothing in terms of high fuel analysis on slick tyres, meaning that the strategic choices have had to be worked out solely on simulations rather than hard data from this weekend.

The teams of course will have plenty of reliable data from previous races and the tyre compounds brought by Pirelli to Spa-Francorchamps are the same as they had here a year ago, so there is some pretty accurate history to work with.

And when all of that is taken into account, a two-stop strategy appears quickest at this point of the weekend.

Given what are likely to be low temperatures (more on that later) and relatively low grip conditions due to earlier wet weather, starting on the soft tyre would give the best performance in the opening laps.

And the soft should be able to hold on without high track temperatures for a long enough stint. Targeting a first stop between lap 10 and lap 15, drivers would then switch to the medium for a second stint and add another 15 laps before taking on another set of mediums for the run to the flag.

A more aggressive approach?

Lewis Hamilton will start from third on the grid for Sunday's race

A slightly more aggressive version of the above strategy includes two stints on the soft compound, which could work depending on how a car is managing its tyres.

The first stint will be crucial in understanding what is possible, and a slightly longer run to the first pit stop will help later in the race, but is not essential.At the first stop the likely switch would be to mediums once again because it opens up flexibility.

Having completed the requirement to run two different tyre compounds during the race, if a driver can then reach lap 28 they can switch to softs once again – or if that proves too challenging with degradation then the medium remains an option from a few laps earlier.

The benefit of the final stint on softs is the increased performance over the medium to allow for overtaking, while it also guards against any light drizzle that might force a pit stop.

Options for the bottom half of the field

Pierre Gasly will start from 12th, despite recording a P3 in Saturday's sprint

It’s not completely out of the question that one or two drivers might gamble on the hard compound at the start to run as long as possible. Should the rain arrive at some stage and everyone dives into the pits, they would gain position over anyone who had already stopped on softer compounds.

But the hard tyre is more likely to be difficult to manage if there is light rain compared to the soft or medium.

A one-stop strategy could well be seen but it is likely that starting on the medium tyre would be preferred to make this approach work. Although giving up some performance on the opening lap to soft-tyre runners, the medium opens up the ability to run as long as Lap 20 based on the data available, then allowing a switch to the hard compound to the end of the race.

Current weather predictions

All eyes will be on the sky during Sunday's race

This is always a challenging section to write because it really is tough to predict the weather at Spa-Francorchamps, where rain can appear out of almost nowhere.

Although rain was forecast at times, that was still the case on Saturday when some heavy showers developed near the circuit in the build-up to the sprint and caused a delay to the start.

The forecast currently suggests a 40 per cent chance of rain during the race, but there has been an increasing possibility of a shower at some stage, so the teams will be factoring that into their strategic calculations.

They at least have plenty of data on how both the full wet and intermediate tyre react this weekend given the wet running on Friday and Saturday, and now know the crossover times when they would need to switch to each tyre.

On low fuel, the crossover point between slick and intermediate is around the one-minute 53 second mark, while between intermediate and full wet it is closer to two-minutes and five seconds.

If it stays dry then lower temperatures than the rest of the weekend are expected, with a high of 17 degrees Celsius during the race that will make tyre warm-up that bit more challenging; but should help with overheating and degradation, again pushing drivers towards the softer compounds available.

Shubham Sangodkar is a former F1 Aerodynamicist with a Master's in Racing Car Design specialising in F1 Aerodynamics and F1 Data Analysis. He also posts aerodynamics content on his YouTube channel, which can be found here.

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