FittingMechanics wrote: ↑08 Oct 2023, 16:47
mwillems wrote: ↑08 Oct 2023, 16:36
FittingMechanics wrote: ↑08 Oct 2023, 16:31
Don't think so. McLaren can run 36 laps on new hard/soft and then a 14 lap on used medium. This leaves about 7 laps (or so). Maybe less - depending on how the laps are counted.
There's a Mandatory 18 lap limit on the tyres, they can't do 36 laps on a Hard and Soft, or am I missing something?
if the New Hards AND mediums can do the 18 laps, that's 36, 21 laps left to run then we'd need the next used mediums to do 15 laps? Even then can used softs do 6 laps? Will mediums stretch 18 laps? I don't know enough about these tyres.
Someone might be able to squeeze in a set of softs somewhere, but it would be the few that have some new softs, but the chance to use softs looks reasonably marginal to me for Mclaren at least. But we will see in a few hours.
Sorry, I miswrote, I meant hard/medium. They can run 18 on new hard and 18 on new medium. That is about 36 or 37 (depending when the lap is counted).
That leaves 20 or 21.
Used tyres are allowed to do 20 laps - both Lando and Oscar have used sets with 6 and 7 laps on them. This means they can do another 14 or 13 laps on them.
So they can easily do 3 stops with sets they have. Or they can choose to run a short soft stint.
Yes 3 stops they can do easy, but there is a maximum of 18 on ANY tires. So softs mandate a 4 stop unless it is a new set I think.
You can deduct the number of used laps a tyre has from 20 to work out how many laps it has run, which is where the 20 has come from, but you cannot physically use any tyre for more than 18 laps. So if you had new Meds and you just drove out and straight into the pits and used 1 lap, still it would have only 18 laps. As you say, if it has used 5 laps, then you can do 15 on it.
Simple, right?
We can do three stops, to use softs means we have to do 4 stops, which is why it is unlikely we will start on softs, or most for that matter.
If we can 36 laps from the new tyres and then we can get 14 laps from a used medium, there is 7-8 laps left to do, can that work on used softs? Hmmmm. But in race events can change everything and maybe 4 stop works out optimal.