Bridgestone announces tyre compounds for final rounds

Bridgestone, the Official Tyre Supplier to the FIA Formula One World Championship, is pleased to announce the final compound allocations of Potenza tyres for the last four rounds of the 2009 FIA Formula One World Championship.

A return is made to the allocation philosophy of leaving a rubber stiffness gap between allocated tyres for the Grands Prix at Suzuka, Japan and Interlagos, Brazil. Consecutive compounds will be used at Singapore and Abu Dhabi, UAE.

Both allocations of dry tyres have to be used in each race, unless the intermediate or wet tyres are used, meaning that competitors need to find the best set-up to utilise the potential of both tyres.

The means of distinguishing between the two compounds on event is by green bands painted on the edges of the tyre sidewalls of the softer tyres at a race. Green is the colour in order to show Bridgestone’s support of the FIA’s Make Cars Green campaign.

Hirohide Hamashima, Bridgestone Director of Motorsport Tyre Development, says: “We are pleased to release our final allocations. Singapore is a street course and based on our experience there last year we feel the soft and super soft is the best choice. For Suzuka we will have a gap in compound hardness. This will be an interesting return to this great circuit as half of the circuit has a new surface, so tyre usage considerations could be challenging.

"In Brazil we also stay with the stiffness gap. It can get very hot in Sao Paulo and we usually see a good race there, although I think we will struggle to have a race as exciting as the one we had last season. Abu Dhabi is a new destination for us. Although it is technically a street course, we are bringing harder compounds than we use at the other street courses. We feel that the hard compound would be too stiff for this new circuit, so we are bringing the consecutive soft and medium compounds.”