Should F1 teams be forced to use all three tire compounds in a GP? Is there a better solution?

Karun Chandhok raised a great talking point on the Sky Sports F1 Podcast last week about tires in Formula 1 and how we keep seeing a majority of one-stop races and how we can create more action and jeopardy. His suggestion is to make teams run all three tire compounds (Soft, Medium and Hard compounds) during a Grand Prix. A great idea in principle forcing people onto a two-stopper allowing for differing strategies thus, in theory, creating more racing and jeopardy for teams and drivers. But is that actually how it would play out? Do the regulations even need to change?

The idea of changes in the tire regulations is something that needs to be addressed Karun iterated “It’s been seven years and nothing’s happened!”. Pirelli is in its 13th year of supplying tires to Formula 1 which was brought in after Bridgestone’s departure at the end of 2010 to produce sets of tires that are designed to degrade. A reason why other manufacturers like Michelin have made a return to the sport is because of this. Michelin’s CEO Florent Menegaux was quoted saying they were “not interested in returning to Formula 1” if the FIA’s desire for a tire “that affects the sporting spectacle” so this is how Pirelli have solely supplied Formula 1 for as long as they have and seemingly will do for the foreseeable future even after the contract expires at the end of 2024.

The idea from a Pirelli standpoint is that their tires degrading would give better racing due to tire management throughout the race and more stops in a Grand Prix. But in past seasons, notably 2022 and the start of 2023, we see the same Medium to Hard one-stop strategy that is seemingly always the favourable choice and rarely see the soft tires being used at all in a Grand Prix race as part of a legitimate strategy call. Saudi Arabia, Baku and Miami were all a one-stop race, Australia was also going to be a one-stop without the safety car and red flag mayhem in the latter stages.

So how did we get to this stage where we are having medium to hard one-stop races, for 2022 a new rule allowed you to start on whatever tires you wanted at the start of a grand prix, thus creating the issue we are talking about now as the one-stop is so much faster due to the degradation on the softs at Miami, for example, being extremely high, they were only predicted to survive six or seven laps during the race. So the easy one-stop comes into play and that is how we keep seeing the same strategy for four out of five races this season.

So would the solution of using all three tire compounds change anything? Not exactly. The fastest way to implement that strategy would be to use the softs at the end of every race, so you would be getting the same medium onto hard strategy and then with around five laps or less you would strap on the softs when you have the least fuel possible in the car to extract the best lap-time and have least stress on the delicate soft tire. Further reasoning that this would be the case is that teams would implement the fastest lap point into the strategy, so teams would again wait until the end stint to use the soft tires due to them having the least amount of fuel in the car. There just seems to be a clear loophole around the main goal.

A counter idea of mine that follows the same philosophy is to get rid of the hard tire from the available compounds, meaning only having the soft and medium compounds. This would mean that teams would be forced to use the soft tire at all venues throughout the year, which would guarantee a two-stop race or more at all races throughout the calendar with no clear loophole for teams and strategists to get around. Indycar have the same system in which they have Reds which are an alternative option tires similar to the Softs in Formula 1. The Blacks, a primary tire, are similar to a medium or a hard making stints three stops or more at most races in Indycar creating a lot of exciting and differing strategies and more on-track racing.

Having this simpler system of just two tire compounds makes it easier for fans and provides exactly what Formula 1 wanted from Pirelli in the first place and follows on from Karun’s idea. Either way, we do need to find a way to cut out these continuous one-stop races in the future.