Following serval incidents of tyre failures and car damage across the Qatar Grand Prix weekend, Mercedes have cited the size of the kerbs at the Losail International Circuit as part of the problem.
Despite speculation that the kerbs were too rough resulting in punctures for Valtteri Bottas, Lando Norris, George Russell and Nicholas Latifi in the latter stages of racing, Mercedes now believe the kerbs were too low, providing little deterrent to avoid driving over them.
Mercedes’ director of trackside engineering Andrew Shovlin says that repeated running over of the kerbs could have placed additional strain on the tyres.
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“It is strange because the issue is that they are actually quite smooth, so therefore you can run all over them,” he said.
“When you run all over them, the front wings are very low to the ground and they are being clipped, plus the tyres are being hit pretty hard by them.
“In a bizarre way, if they were more aggressive it would probably be easier for the cars and the tyres.
“But the fact that you can get on them, and the quickest thing is to get on them as well, means you have got to do it here, and therein lies the risk.”
However, race director Michael Masi has responded saying that the kerbs in place at Losail are regularly used across both F1 and MotoGP circuits, including at Austria’s Red Bull Ring
“They’re the standard FIA/FIM kerbs that we’ve seen at the last two corners at Austria forever,” he said.
“I think one of the things is that drivers were trying to use everything to their full advantage.”
Pirelli will conduct a full laboratory analysis of their tyres at their base in Milan.
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